KUALA LUMPUR, July 26 — One government health clinic is trying to easing congestion of patients by delivering medication to their homes.

This is done by employing runners who send the medicines by motorcycles.

And more patients nationwide are requesting that the Health Ministry look into starting up such services in their areas.

In its Facebook page, the Health Ministry said the initiative was taken by the Pengkalan Chepa health clinic in Kelantan.

Advertisement

The trial project, called “Kawe Ata Ubat Demo — RxDelivery 2U,” charges patients between RM3 and RM5 for each delivery.

This initiative, said the ministry, would reduce cost and save patients time besides reducing patient congestion at health clinics.

Sinar Harian recently reported that the Pengkalan Chepa clinic was the first clinic in the country to offer such services.

Advertisement

Delivery runners have been given training on how to handle medicine. — Picture courtesy of Facebook/ Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia
Delivery runners have been given training on how to handle medicine. — Picture courtesy of Facebook/ Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia

Quoting the clinic's pharmaceutical officer Mohammad Aswady Adenan, the daily reported that the service began operation in May.

“This Value-Added-Service is only for interested patients and patients who fulfill requirements,” he said.

Aswady told the daily that that he came up with the idea after seeing many senior citizens facing problems to come to the clinic to pick up their medicine.

“I pitied them as some of them live far from the clinic. After registering, they need to wait for the medicine to be dispersed,” he added.

On concerns over the choice of runners used to send the medicine, the ministry said they had been given training on how to handle medicine.

“And the medicine sent are follow-up medicine and only involved certain patients,” it said, adding that the concept had gone through strict filtering before it was allowed to be implemented.