New regulations announced for day surgery centres in Dubai

All processes from pre-surgical assessments and tests to the surgery need to be conducted at the same centre itself.- Alamy Image

Day surgery centres (DSC) will be able to carry out surgeries only if they meet certain requirements related to health professionals' qualifications and medication, the Dubai Health Authority (DHA) announced on Saturday. In May, the authority gave a deadline of 18 months to one-day surgery centres to obtain international accreditation. It also said it would increase the frequency of inspections to the facilities.
Currently, 97 per cent of all hospitals in Dubai are internationally accredited.
The announcement came as the authority launched investigations into two complaints filed last month. As reported by Khaleej Times earlier, an Emirati woman is in a comatose state after a cosmetic surgery allegedly went wrong. In another case, an Indian woman died during a hip replacement surgery.
Dr Marwan Al Mulla, CEO of Health Regulation Sector, said the standards would fall under four major categories: Health facility, health professionals, service provision and reporting and inspection. Under the 'health facilities' category, licensure will be categorised into four sub-categories. This means that each type of DSC will have restrictions on the type of anesthesia/sedation medication it can hold and services it can provide. "Only DSC (sub-)category C can provide general anaesthesia. All DSCs will only be allowed to treat healthy patients or patients with mild diseases and are required to have in place emergency transfer arrangements that are in line with Dubai ambulance emergency targets," the DHA said.
All processes from pre-surgical assessments and tests to the surgery need to be conducted at the same centre itself. Updated medications and emergency equipment should be fully available in case of an emergency.
Under the second category, all health professionals at the centre should be either consultants or specialists. Similarly, other categories have their own specific requirements.
The sector has developed 20 key performance indicators and the DSCs will be evaluated against these benchmarks every three months.
asmaalizain@khaleejtimes.com
 

Asma Ali Zain

asmaalizain@khaleejtimes.com