More than 70 speakers from different countries will participate in the two-day conference to discuss enhancing developments in the home health care field.
“There are at least 48,000 patients in need of home health care in Makkah province. Unfortunately, this number is expected to increase by 12 percent in 2030. The number of elderly people is also expected to increase,” said Princess Adela bint Abdullah, head of the National Foundation Charity for Home Health Care in the western region of Saudi Arabia, who organized the event.
“The available home health care service in the Kingdom doesn’t cover this large number of elderly people. We are only able to cover 3 percent of elderly patients,” she added, while calling for greater cooperation between organizations and government sector hospitals to develop more related health care services.
The conference will also discuss the international experience in the field of home health care, the challenges home health care providers face, reducing the cost of such care, the relationship between patients and their families and the media's role in raising awareness of the issue.
“A new program called ‘Home Medicine’ was launched one year ago by the Health Ministry,” said Dr. Aisha Al-Saghir, a member of the conference's Scientific Committee.
“This program covered 5,000 patients within a year and a half. Such a step is considered great, but we still need to enhance the cooperative work between private and government sectors.”
