Overwhelming patient numbers at the Colonial War Memorial Hospital in Suva is contributing to staff burnout and overcrowding issues, says a World Bank report on Fiji’s health system that was released yesterday.

And the Health Ministry’s temporary solution of offloading patients to major urban health centres is resulting in the closure of critical services including diabetic foot care and outreach services.

The report says CWMH, Fiji’s national referral hospital, and other major urban health facilities are consistently operating at near full capacity, leading to them often having to offload patients to other care facilities.

The Valelevu Health Center, with a catchment population of 60,000, serves as one of CWMH’s offload facilities for outpatient and inpatient care, despite not being equipped or classified as a hospital.

The report highlights that due to its high patient load, Valelevu recently had to close its diabetic foot care clinic and limit outreach activities.

Similar trends are seen at other urban health centers, which struggle to provide preventative care.

This results in delayed diagnoses and avoidable complications that require costly treatment at higher levels of care.

World Bank Country Director for Papua New Guinea and the Pacific, Stephen Ndegwa, adds says the situation causes stress and burnout among healthcare staff.

He says that many rural hospitals in Fiji have low utilization rates.

Hospitals in the Northern Division, for example, average only 30 percent bed occupancy, while those in the Eastern Division have an average bed occupancy of just 10 percent, suggesting underutilization relative to the investment in these facilities.

The Fijian government had requested the World Bank to conduct the review to assess the health sector’s performance in addressing the country’s major health challenges.

“The health sector review serves as our collective baseline for the health system challenges we face to see where we can then improve. It sets the pathway for Fiji adding another 10 years of life expectancy to its population and therefore building a healthy nation. And it proposes the trajectory of how to get there. It provides policy reform recommendations, suggested programmatic investments, and invites coordinated action from within government and development partners.”

Ndegwa says on the positive side the World Bank has joined hands with Australia and the Asian Development Bank to develop a master plan for the CWM hospital.

He states that a lot of work is ongoing with development partners in various areas of the health sector.