Valenzuela’s general hospital to ‘re-open’

After virtually closing down for five days due to the invasion of a potentially fatal bacteria, Valenzuela General Hospital (VGH) authorities announced yesterday they will be returning to normal operations effective today, Maundy Thursday.

Aida Cuadra, chief nurse and spokesperson for VGH, a 100-bed capacity tertiary hospital operated by the Department of Health (DOH), revealed the information to The STAR in an interview yesterday even as she tried to dispel rumors of any outbreak of meninggococcemia or any such other fatal diseases.

The official said the hospital, in a way,"re-opens" with all the usual medical and health facilities and services available to the public.

City Mayor Sherwin Gatchalian said early on that he has ordered the Valenzuela (Polo) Emergency Hospital, run and operated by the city government and headed by Dr. Antonio Olegario, city health officer, to open and be prepared to accept additional patients.

The emergency 20-bed hospital noticed an additional five patients every night referred to them during the temporary closure of the VGH, Olegario said.

Health officials said the VGH had to stop admitting patients, except the emergency room, to give way to a general cleaning and disinfection of the facility, including among others, beds, door knobs, equipment, machines, ventilators and bed pans.

The clean up measure was intended to stop the proliferation of pseudomonas aeruginosa, a bacteria found earlier to have infected a patient who delivered a baby and returned to the hospital complaining of a wound that would not heal immediately.

The woman patient returned last March 24 and laboratory tests conducted showed the presence of the potent bacteria in her system prompting authorities to declare the "closure."

Cuadra described pseudomonas as an "opportunistic bacteria" or one which, when present in a person with a weak immune system, could cause severe complications in the lungs like pneumonia or in the blood like that of septicemia that could lead eventually to death.

Otherwise, she said, the bacteria is common in soil, in fruits, in things, in the households or in other buildings, including hospitals.

Olegario said the pseudomonas found in the hospital is a "more potent bacteria" than the one found outside because it has already been exposed to the antibiotics there and have likely developed a resistance to them and mutated accordingly.

Cuadra also clarified that, in fact, it was not a total shutdown for the tertiary hospital, which still opened its emergency room-cum-delivery room (ER) for expectant mothers and the outpatient department since the partial closure last Saturday.