MANILA, 30 June 2003 — A hospital in Metro Manila may lose its accreditation with the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) for mistreating an Overseas Filipino Worker (OFW) suffering from a serious kidney illness. In an interview over Radio Veritas yesterday, OWWA administrator Virgilio Angelo said they might strike out the South Superhighway Medical Center (SSMC) from the welfare agency’s accreditation list amid a complaint by Umbra Tatak Sapi, a native of Sultan sa Barongis town in Maguindanao province.
Sapi said that because of the severity of his illness, doctors recommended his transfer to another hospital. But the management of SSMC in Bicutan, Taguig, held him for 32 hours he because he had to settle his account.
Sapi, 41, arrived in the country on Wednesday after he was medically repatriated from Saudi Arabia where he had worked for 14 years. He needed a kidney transplant but such an operation was not allowed in Saudi Arabia.
Sapi was immediately admitted at the SSMC, which has been accredited by the OWWA to handle the cases of medically repatriated OFWs.
Cynthia Lamban, chief of OWWA’s workers welfare division, said the SSMC was accredited “primarily because of its proximity to the NAIA (Ninoy Aquino International Airport).”
But Sapi complained that he practically did not get medical attention except blood and urine tests, daily blood pressure reading, three doses of medicine and his board and lodging. Head nurse Tina Hernandez told the Inquirer that the hospital could not treat Sapi’s case because it lacked the equipment.
Reached by Sapi’s family, Dr. Dingdong Biruar, a medical internist at the National Kidney Transplant Institute, said he would attend to the case of the OFW as soon as he returned to Manila from Cotabato City.
On Friday afternoon, Sapi related, Dr. Celestino Dalisay, an internist at the SSMC, handed him a referral note allowing him to seek medical attention in a “hospital of his choice.”
“(Dalisay) told me that I could now go out anytime,” Sapi said.
According to him, however, he was not allowed to leave despite the valid OWWA-issued Philhealth pre-medical need certification and documents.
Sapi reportedly had to leave his passport before he could be allowed to leave.
“Mahirap kasi pag sa OWWA (It’s difficult when bills are charged to OWWA),” Hernandez said.
But SSMC assistant administrator Socorro Hidalgo denied that the hospital refused to treat Sapi. She said he was asked to “transfer to a hospital of his choice” because they did not have a dialysis machine.
Hospital cashier Gloria Ramos said doctors had recommended the transfer of Sapi when he was brought to the SSMC on Wednesday. But the National Kidney Transplant Institute could not accommodate him at that time.
Sapi was given the option to stay, go home or transfer to another hospital and the OFW chose to stay, Ramos said.
