New Home Healthcare Services office opened

Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) has inaugurated a new satellite office for the Home Healthcare Services (HHCS) and the bespoke seating and mobility service, located in a building adjacent to the Al Wakrah Health Center.
Ali Janahi, HMC Chief of Business Services, and Mahmoud Al Raisi, HMC Chief of Continuing Care, inaugurated and toured the facility and met with staff and patients. The new HHCS satellite office, which will serve as a base from which healthcare teams conduct home visits, will provide administrative support for patients and families in Al Wakrah and the surrounding region.
“Both services form an integral part of Hamad’s continuing care service offering and are in alignment with Qatar’s National Health Strategy goals to provide more preventative and community-based care across the country,” said Janahi. “The new Al Wakrah branch office for Home Healthcare Services is an excellent example of this strategy in action and is already delivering significant benefit to over 300 patients.”
The HHCS provides care for children, adult and older residents who are temporarily or permanently housebound. The multidisciplinary care approach includes home visits by doctors, nurses and allied health professionals who perform a variety of medical support procedures, such as oxygen administration, catheter changes and a number of therapies and services, including respiratory, physical, occupational and speech therapy.
This model of care supports patients’ timely discharge from hospital and the clinical care and medical supervision provided helps to reduce Emergency and Outpatient Department visits and hospital admissions.
Patients or family members can request these services and other related home healthcare resources by referral from their doctor. The service is available from 7am to 8pm, Sunday to Thursday, with extended care available if required.
“Our patients, especially those living in the south of Qatar, have asked for easier access to specialised care in the home,” said Al Raisi. “The Al Wakrah office allows the HMC Home Healthcare Services team to be more accessible to patients and families who live south of Doha; it also means they can provide a more timely response to patients’ needs in their home.”
The seating and mobility service provides disabled patients who are experiencing mobility issues with an objective and systematic assessment of their seating and mobility needs.
The service was moved from Rumailah Hospital to this new dedicated office which includes assessment, training and education facilities as well as an onsite workshop with skilled technicians who customise and adapt equipment for the individual patients’ needs.
“We are immensely proud of the seating and mobility service, which provides specialised seating and mobility assessment and equipment to over 2250 children and adults with physical disabilities throughout the country. Often this service offers a new lease of life to patients whose condition would previously have kept them house and even bed-bound,” said Janahi.
“About 60 percent of our patients are adults and 40 percent are children who have received a custom-built power-chair, wheelchair or even customised vehicles, enabling them to move about more freely and independently,” Al Raisi added. “While the service is free to Qatari patients, our teams have worked closely with charities and donors to help many non-Qatari patients benefit from this amazing service.”
The HHCS and seating and mobility service are managed by the Qatar Rehabilitation Institute, which is part of HMC’s Continuing Care Group which includes long-term and community-based care programmes.