PIA Press Release
Thursday, January 05, 2012

Doctor-less municipalities in E.Visayas down to 3

TACLOBAN CITY, Leyte, Jan 5 (PIA) –- With the recent deployment of 10 young medical graduates to 10 doctor-less municipalities, there remains only three municipalities in Eastern Visayas without doctors, the Department of Health informed.

DOH-8 Director Edgardo Gonzaga identified these municipalities as Santo Nino, Jiabong, and Tagapul-an, all in the province of Samar.

Gonzaga expressed hope the next deployment will include doctors for the said places.

He recalled that in 2009, there were 15 municipalities in the region without medical professionals. It is a big help that the number had dwindled to just three.

The DOH director said that before, indigent patients had to travel long hours to go to clinical specialists in provincial or city centers.

The thrust of the Doctor to the Barrio (DTTB) Program is to provide medical care by deploying competent, dedicated doctors twice a year to far-flung areas that needed them most.

These areas are typically underdeveloped and economically challenged municipalities described as isolated, depressed, and hard to reach. Deployed doctors are expected to render two years of service in the municipalities.

These Doctors to the Barrios receive about P28,000 ($995.231) a month in salaries and other benefits. They serve the municipality for two years.

Those who get married to locals prefer to remain in the municipality.

A number had been taken in by the local government units (LGU) as their municipal health officers.

The Department of Health pays for the salaries of the doctor but on the third year, the doctor and the Department of Health negotiate with the municipality to take in the doctor as the regular municipal health officer paid by the LGU. (PIA 8)