BACOLOD CITY – Authorities claimed that the pace of the ongoing P92 million renovation of Corazon Locsin Montelibano Memorial Regional Hospital (CLMMRH) Emergency Department is faster than they expected.
Twenty-two days after the start of renovations on September 28, Department of Health Negros Island Region Undersecretary Dr. Mary Ann Maestral disclosed recently that the
project is 9.79 percent finished, expressing satisfaction with the speed of the construction of the healthcare facility.
Based on the hospital’s contract with the construction firm DuraBuild, the renovation must be completed before December 31 this year. The timeline was established to efficiently attend to the needs of the patients in the region.
“I am very happy with the way things are now at CLMMRH. The rehabilitation must be done by December 31, but I told them that the earlier it is finished, the better,” Maestral said.
She further said that they had already fixed the waiting area near the emergency department for the comfort and safety of the visitors and family members of the patients.
“We already fixed the waiting area; actually, the progress now is earlier than planned,” she added.
MOTHER AND CHILD UNIT NEXT
Maestral reported that after the renovation of the emergency department, the DOH had already planned and budgeted the rehabilitation of the hospital’s Mother and Child Unit, which is now being utilized as a holding area for the patients due to the ongoing construction.
“Before the end of the year, we will open our bidding for the rehabilitation of the Mother and Child Unit so that it can be utilized and can cater to more patients,” she said, citing that the complaints of the public that the hospital cannot cater to numbers of patients were due to the state of the facility.
The DOH allocated a P65 million budget for the upcoming rehabilitation of the facility.
SOLAR POWER
Maestral disclosed that the CLMMRH is currently taking steps to convert the facility to be powered by solar energy.
“CLMMRH is now converting to a solar-powered facility, but the DOH cannot take credit for that because they used their own money for that initiative,” she said, as few solar panels had already been installed on the roofs of the hospital. (Richard Caballero Jr. via tvds