The Ministry of Health (MOH) has increased the bed capacity of its hospitals in 2017 by 1,822 beds; thus, making 43,675 beds in total instead of 41,835 beds. This came as part of MOH’s endeavors to enhance hospital’s bed capacity for inpatient wards and to reduce hospitalization waiting lists. By Allah’s Grace, this has positively improved MOH’s medical services and boosted patient satisfaction. To that end, MOH has inaugurated new hospitals, and geared up the present capacity of hospitals by recruiting more doctors and adding more beds.
In its 2017 achievements report, MOH stated that one-day surgeries increased from 44% to 55% (with 112,095 one-day surgeries). Also, waiting lists were reduced through supplying health facilities with needed appliances for one-day surgeries, in addition to key indicators to increase the number of this type of surgeries.
It is worth mentioning that the Ministry of Health (MOH) is currently implementing MOH's Performance Program «Adaa’», which aims to boost productivity, performance quality and efficiency of health services in hospitals. The program is in line with the strategic objectives of the National Transformation Program 2020 towards achieving the Saudi Vision 2030. The program covers 70 main hospitals and features over 40 indicators to measure the performance of seven key therapeutic aspects, which have positively reduced the waiting times. Also, MOH has launched a daily specialization-based e-Waiting List for surgical operations on its online portal. The list features the MOH's hospitals, along with surgical specializations and corresponding waiting days respectively. The list also includes five levels of waiting days, from one to 180 days
By launching this initiative, MOH aims to update all patients and beneficiaries of services provided by its health facilities on the developmental efforts for boosting performance levels and providing high-quality services to satisfy and meet the health needs of citizens, who are the focus of its attention and main partner in advancing the health work process.