Muscat Private Hospital, and others.

Well that was a nice break - I hope you all enjoyed your Eid vacations.


This is a blog post that I've been trying to write on and off for quite some time. I've come to the conclusion that I cant prove anything as I'm obviously not a doctor, and can't get one to go on record (I haven't even tried) about anything that happens here in Oman at these health care facilities.

I was first approached by a reader half a year ago, and told to look into private hospitals that have been opening up around town (and even further afield these days). Over the months I've come across various stories that have left me shaking my head, and with a sole determination that should I or anyone close to me have an urgent need for medical healthcare here in Oman, we're going to a Government hospital.

Here are just two stories:

1. A married couple drove to the recently opened (well, late 2009) Al Raffah hospital in Ghubra late at night. The hospital boasts a 24hour ER facility (source - read the 5th sentence in the 3rd paragraph) and so they went there as it was the closest ER to them. Upon arriving at the ER, they were promptly told to go to the Royal hospital as they could not treat the man there. By the time this couple had gotten to the Royal, the husband had died of a heart attack and was DOA. Over the months I've heard similar stories of people being turned away by the "emergency room" at Raffah. Why are they allowed to continue to operate an Emergency Room?

2. Muscat Private Hospital and pregnancies. I am not joking about this - I have heard numerous alarming stories about problems that seem to occur with births at the MPH. On the one side, I'm no Doctor and a lot of these stories could be based on over-worrying parents who are not getting the information/confidence/communication they need when dealing with their new born children and the occasional issues babies have. However, it seems to me that the stories of problems are growing at MPH. I'm aware of 3 separate births in the last 2 months alone where there have been significant questions raised over the practices at MPH. I just feel that this is worth airing in public - where there's smoke, sometimes there's fire.

Now, I've no way to prove any of this, and so I've decided to let this story out and ask you all what your experiences have been with these "private hospitals". It appears that the Ministry of Health appears to grant licenses to these private institutions, but any sort of review or regulatory inspection seems to be a bit difficult to tie down. I'm left asking the question: Who's checking on these "hospitals" to make sure they are up to scratch? Who's regulating them? Self regulation is just something I don't think can happen when you're talking about people's lives.

So anyway - over to you, please share your experiences!

le fin