King Fahad Specialist Hospital- Tabuk has successfully reduced the rate of eye patient referral to specialist hospitals outside the region, as the ophthalmology unit conducted around 267 advanced surgeries such as: cataract, glaucoma, retina, elderly and pediatric cosmetic surgeries, in addition to emergency interventions. This has helped to reduce the rate of referring such cases to specialist hospitals outside the region, to save patients the burden of traveling and to reduce appointment intervals. This comes in continuation of the efforts exerted by Tabuk Health Affairs to provide all specialized medical services to patients in the region.
It is noted that the hospital has achieved advanced results in MOH's Performance Program, which aims to boost productivity, performance quality and efficiency of health services in hospitals. The program is in line with the National Transformation Program 2020 towards achieving the Saudi's Vision 2030. The program covers 70 hospitals and features over 40 indicators to measure the performance of seven key therapeutic aspects, which have positively reduced the waiting times.
On the other hand, MOH has recently launched the (e-health) App. to facilitate access to visual medical consultations on smartphones. In so doing, MOH seeks to employ cutting-edge technologies to enhance effective communication with service beneficiaries, and to provide them with the needed specialized medical consultations.
According to MOH, the first stage of the new App. will cover the Northern Borders, Asir, Tabuk, Jazan, Najran and Al-Jouf Health Affairs. The, the App will be used across the Kingdom, Allah Willing.
The App. is designed to enable audio-video communication from 9 a.m. to 12 a.m. during working days, and from 1 p.m. to 12 a.m. on weekends. Accordingly, users can login into the App., communicate directly with a specialist, and have their cases diagnosed through the App. Hence, the specialist can answer the users' inquiries, and provide the needed medical consultation and the necessary medical procedure.