OUR ASSOCIATION IN CAMBODIA

COUNTRY REPORT

CATHOLIC HEALTHCARE WORKERS ASSOCIATION OF CAMBODIA

Savoeun CHOUNG, MD.

Catholic Healthcare workers Association of Cambodia is a very newborn association which was established on September 26th, 2016 after been taken long time to learn and to understand, by joining the 14th AFCMA Congress in Hong Kong and the 15th in Bali in Indonesia, how to be formed in Cambodia. We have started now with six junior doctors and eight nurses. The aims of the association are to spread the catholic morality throughout the medical profession and to develop the medical skills. Moreover, is to study and report the problems which confront the catholic medical profession in Cambodia and share and to render medical and social services to the community. We are applying to be recognized by the FIAMC and AFCMA as well.

The Christianity in Cambodia is about 3.0% only among the 16 million estimated population which is Buddhism is the national and majority religion. The Catholic Church in Cambodia sees that health care to poor and vulnerable people is the priority. So The Church runs Healthcare Project called CATHOLIC COMMUNITY HEALTH SERVISES, St. Luke and St. Elizabeth sick shelters, to contribute the services to them. With the project the Catholic Church aims to give health and spiritual care to sick people at any level, both for simple sicknesses and very serious sicknesses. The Catholic Church firmly believes that the proclamation of the Gospel, in a land where 95% of the population is Buddhist, passes also through this kind of approach that shows in a very concrete way the closeness and the care of the Risen Lord for the poor and the sick. To achieve this, the healthcare workers of the Catholic Church of Cambodia work on its mission “to promote human dignity, inspire hope through the daily care to each patient”.

The Current Pastoral Healthcare Project: Catholic Community Health Services

Province Program

In each province there are trained local health volunteers, known as the Local Health Referents (LHRs) who are responsible for providing basic health education to villagers, following up returning patients, and accompanying patients to local health facilities. The LHRs work under the supervision of a provincial program manager. This component also communicates and liaises with the provincial health directors of each of the three provinces.

Sick Shelters Program

The two sick shelters provide diagnostic, counseling and treatment services, and referrals to various health facilities in Phnom Penh. Patients who are in need of referral and whose conditions are acute (rather than chronic) are accommodated in St. Luke. Patients who need chronic care, or are in advanced and terminal stages of disease, such as cancers, are accommodated in St. Elizabeth, where palliative care is provided, as well as funeral services. St. Elizabeth seems to be more like a hospice. Patients in both facilities are provided with all necessary medicines, access to laboratory examinations, x-rays and other diagnostic tests. Food, beds, basic necessities, and transport to/from the hospitals and back to the provinces is also provided. Bedside Care is provided by the health facilitators, the shelter physicians and the night shift volunteers.

The Pastoral Healthcare Project Plan; PHNOM PENH CATHOLIC HOSPITAL 2022

VISION:

Our dream is to develop the Catholic Community Health Services by building a hospital to provide some services that could contribute to develop the health care in Cambodia and especially apply the way of Jesus: care the poorest, healing them and give hope for all who have no more hope in their life.

MISSION:

Phnom Penh Catholic Hospital 2022 would be a GENERAL HOSPITAL with some important services to fulfill our mission of Mercy and Life as: