With reference to the letter entitled 'Keep pharmacy open on Sunday for retirees, elderly and the infirm' (The Star, Sept 7th) by Dr. A Soorian, it was stated that patients can no longer collect their medicines on Sundays in Hospital Tuanku Ja’afar, Seremban.

We would like to clarify that the pharmacy in Hospital Tuanku Ja’afar (HTJ) still operates 24 hours a day all year round but dispensing is now done from the Emergency & Trauma Pharmacy on weekends and public holidays instead of from the Outpatient Pharmacy. We would like to apologise if there was insufficient notification to the public on this change and action will be taken to rectify this situation.

The change was done for several reasons one of which was optimisation of staffing and not due to lack of funding for overtime payments as suggested in the letter.

With regard to the complaint on the long waiting time at the pharmacy, we will certainly look into it as it is one of the Key Performance Indicators being monitored by the Ministry of Health. We will endeavour to ensure that patients receive their medicines within 30 minutes as far as possible.

In order to overcome problems of long waiting times, congestion during peak hours and parking woes, HTJ and other government pharmacies throughout the country offer a variety of mechanisms through which patients can collect their repeat medications. Amongst the services offered are “SMS & Take”, “Drive Through Pharmacies” and the Integrated Drug Dispensing System through which patients can get their prescriptions filled at facilities of their choice nearer to their homes. Patients can also opt to have their medicines delivered to their door step through the “Ubat Melalui Pos” (Medicines through Post) system and their repeat medicines will be couriered by PosLaju to them for a nominal fee.

These innovative dispensing systems have been introduced together with after office hours pharmacy services to allow patients to collect medicines at their own convenience.

We thank the writer for highlighting these issues and we would like to reiterate that we are here to serve the public. We abide not only by the slogan “1Malaysia: People First, Performance Now” but also the Ministry of Health’s motto “Kami Sedia Membantu” (“We Are Ready to Serve”).

Dato’ Eisah Binti A. Rahman
Senior Director
Pharmaceutical Services Division
Ministry of Health Malaysia

source:pharmacy.gov.my