Clinic to offer ‘best’

PROVISIONS have been made for sufferers of prostate cancer and diabetes in the St John polyclinic to be built over the next 18 months.
Architect of the project, Michael C. Lashley, of Michael Lashley Architects Ltd, said that no effort would be spared to ensure that Barbadians, especially those in St John and the surrounding parishes, got the best in health care.
 “It is said that Barbados is the amputation capital of the world. This is something that I am not proud of and I hate to hear. One of the very important aspects of care for diabetics is foot care and to this end, we are having a podiatry department where people can have that attention.
 “There is a catheter replacement. In the advanced stage of prostate cancer and other urinary illnesses, people have to have their urine taken by catheter. Changing it is a painstaking process with many associated difficulties. The polyclinic has a specialized area for that,” he said.
The $16.3 million multipurpose clinic will have a health and wellness centre, a three-bed observation unit, an ambulance bay and will also have provision for X-ray, mammogram and ultrasound services.
The upper floor will be devoted to health services while the lower level will house the St John branch of the National Library Service.
This is the first polyclinic being built in Barbados in two decades and Lashley said much planning had been undertaken to move to the next level.