Specialized rehabilitation for the rising number of people in the Kingdom with disabilities can reduce the cost to the state by freeing up hospital beds, and lessen the burden on families and caregivers.
This was stated by Abdullah Hamad bin Zarah, chief executive officer of Sultan bin Abdulaziz Humanitarian City (SBAHC), a rehabilitation hospital and medical center in Riyadh.
Bin Zarah told Arab News recently that studies found that more than 750,000 individuals in Saudi Arabia suffer from some form of disability. Many patients have had to seek treatment on their own or go abroad for specialized care.
He said that a review of some 2,400 records of patients of the Mayo Clinic in the United States, who had undergone coronary intervention over a 14-year period from 1994 to 1998, revealed that the mortality rate for patients who had participated in the clinic’s cardiac rehabilitation program was nearly 50 percent less than for those patients who had not joined.
“On an economic level, it allows acute care hospitals to free up vital beds for urgent cases. Some studies show that currently up to 25 percent of the Ministry of Health's beds in Saudi Arabia are occupied by long-term patients."
"Socially, access to specialized rehabilitation services has alleviated families or caregivers from the burden of care,” Bin Zarah said, adding that rehabilitation has the potential to provide previously incapacitated patients with the opportunity to rejoin society as productive members.
“The SBAHC took this opportunity to serve the community by specializing in rehabilitation medicine and providing it with world-class rehabilitation services. Over the years, the SBAHC has managed to position itself as the leading rehabilitation center in the region, showing that rehabilitation is a vital component of health care,” he said.
In comparison to other acute care hospitals that provide rehabilitation services, costs at a specialized rehabilitation center are generally lower. However, specialized services provided at SBAHC does entail additional expenditures. The SBAHC seeks to provide the latest care modalities through highly qualified staff which results not only in lower costs but in better outcomes as well, he said.
He said the Arab Health Congress in 2014 would allow leaders to meet and share experiences. “What I have learned over the years is that almost all health care facilities have similar issues. What is unique, however, is that different solutions work for different institutions. Having such a forum enables us to not only learn about new strategies and technologies but solutions to the problems we face,” he said.
Special rehab could cut government disability bill
