“We thank you and the employees of the Ministry of Health for your outstanding efforts to improve health-care services in the Kingdom,” Crown Prince Sultan said in his letter to the health minister, praying to Almighty Allah for His continuous blessings for the improvement of health services.
Responding to the Crown Prince's letter, Al-Rabeeah returned his thanks and gratitude to the Saudi leaders for their generosity to the people.
Al-Rabeeah explained that the book revealed the most prominent indicators of public health and the development of health resources, activities and services provided by the ministry.
“It has also outlined the multifarious developments in the health sector during the past two years,” the minister said. “The book clearly enumerated the statistical details of the various regions and governorates in the Kingdom, especially with regard to the significant decline in the number of infectious diseases due to the successful immunization campaign carried out throughout the Kingdom.”
Incidence of fever and meningitis was reduced to 0.02 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2009,while diphtheria declined to 0.004 per 100,000 people, whooping cough to 0.1 and neonatal tetanus and measles to 0.02 and 0.32 respectively. German measles was reduced to 0.05 and hepatitis B to 19.78 per 100,000 inhabitants.
The minister said there was a remarkable enhancement of services in the health sectors in all fields.
The number of hospitals was increased to 244 from 225, up by 8.4 percent, while, the total number of beds was increased from 31,240 to 33,277 beds — a 5.9 percent increase.
The number of health workers, including medics and paramedics, was recorded at 123,643 against 101,789, an increase of 21 percent. At present the Health Ministry cadre includes 25,832 doctors, 1,654 pharmacists, 63,297 nurses and 32,360 technicians.
Under a new scheme introduced by the ministry last year, patients need not travel from region to region in search of better medical health care except in rare circumstances since the facilities and the needed health professionals are available in all regions. Emergency rooms in all health institutions including the regional health directorates have been set up on a 24-hour basis from where patients can be transferred to a region where urgent surgery can be done, especially in the case of organ transplantation.
Al-Rabeeah said the vision of the ministry is to deliver comprehensive health care at individual, family and community levels, maintaining services both in quantity and quality and in particular to help the elderly and those with special needs.
The average annual number of patients consulting ministry facilities has exceeded 60 million, a figure that may increase to 75 million in the near future.
Currently in the Kingdom, the doctor-patient ratio is 1:4,000, but the program intends to bring it down to 1:400. Some 50,000 physicians are currently working in the Kingdom. In the primary health-care sector alone, there are 10,000 physicians working in the government, public and private sectors.
The ministry has added four specialized centers for treating AIDS patients in Asir, Madinah, Al-Jouf and Ahsa. It has also established 20 consultative optional clinics for those who want to check AIDS confidentially. In addition, 55 centers for detecting TB have been established and another 35 centers are expected to be added in the coming years.
In the Kingdom, the potential for curing this disease is 85 percent and its rate of detection is 75 percent.
