Annual Report 2005 - Changi General Hospital

CHANGI GENERAL HOSPITAL
Changi General Hospital is a 797-bed hospital committed to caring
for communities living in eastern Singapore. I t has a total staff
strength of more than 2,000 and provides specialised care in
more than 20 medical and surgical disciplines. A centre of excellence
in sports medicine, dermatology and geriatric medicine, CGH continues
to develop its capabilities in these areas.

SingHealth Annual Repor t 2005
M essage from the CEO
One of our most significant achievements in 2005 was to receive the prestigious
Joint Commission International ( JCI) accreditation. The JCI accreditation
ack nowledged that our patient safety and clinical quality standards are on par
with international standards. To ser ve patients even better, we will continue to
expand our clinical exper tise in spor ts medicine, urology, geriatric medicine and
laborator y medicine.
We are also committed to improving the health of the community beyond the
hospital’s walls. This year, we trained senior volunteers as health ambassadors
to reach out to the less-privileged elderly. We also established TR aCS ( Trauma
Recover y & Corporate Solutions) to help corporations improve their employees’
health.
T.K. Udairam
CEO, CGH
CLINICAL EXCELLENCE
Opening of CSMC’s M edical Wing and Specialist
Eye Clinics
Dr V ivian Balak rishnan, M inister for Community
D evelopment, Youth and Spor ts, officially opened
the newly expanded Changi Spor ts M edicine Centre
(CSMC) and the Specialist Eye Clinics on Nov 11,
2005. The CGH Specialist Eye Clinic is the result of
a par tnership with doc tors from Singapore National
Eye Centre. I t aims to bring quality ophthalmologic
ser vices to residents in the East.
In conjunc tion with the CSMC opening, the Helmas
fitness testing ser vice was introduced in Singapore
for the first time. The Helmas machine has eight
test stations to assess and elec tronically record
an individual’s strength, power, aerobic capacity,
anaerobic capacity, flexibility, proprioception
(position awareness) and agility. Besides helping to
develop all-round fitness and hence enhance spor ts
per formance, it also helps refine the rehabilitation
programme for injured or post-operative patients.
Patients with medical conditions like obesity,
diabetes, hyper tension, coronar y ar ter y disease and
high cholesterol will also benefit as the system makes
exercise prescription safer and more accurate.
Falls Assessment Clinic
A Falls Assessment Clinic was initiated on Oct 17,
2005, to reduce the risk of falls and injuries among
the elderly. A CGH study of 480 patients aged 70
years and above, who were admitted over a sixmonth
period, found that 120 patients or 25% of them
repor ted a histor y of falls. Among the elderly who
fell, approximately 30% of them suffered frac tures.
Through the Falls Assessment Clinic, CGH hopes
to reduce the occurrence of falls, thereby helping
the elderly avoid the serious consequences
and complications that of ten follow, including
hospitalisation, the premature loss of func tion and
independence, and sometimes death.

CHANGI GENERAL HOSPITAL
B otox for Urinar y Incontinence
CGH is one of the few hospitals in Singapore where
female patients can receive botox treatment not for
wrink les but to treat an overac tive bladder. Patients
with overac tive bladders find it difficult to “hold on”
when the need to pass urine is felt. Some patients are
urge incontinent, i.e., they leak urine before they are
able to reach the toilet. Intravesical botox is being
used on urge incontinent patients who have not
had success with bladder training and medication.
Consultant Urologist Dr Pearllyn Quek has per formed
the new procedure for more than 10 patients and the
results have been ver y encouraging.
BMRC Grant
Consultant M icrobiologist Dr Tan Thean Yen won the
A*STAR Biomedical Research Council’s 4th BMRC grant
on Jan 16, 2006, for his three-year research projec t,
“A study of the in-vitro ac tivity of antifungal agents
on bloodstream isolates of yeasts in Singapore”.
Competition for the grant was k een – 50 successful
applications were selec ted from a pool of about 160
research proposals.
general hospital. The
move will facilitate
the step-down care
for patients who
are ready to be
discharged from
acute care at a
general hospital. A
sk ybridge at Level 2
was opened on April
15, 2005, to link CGH
and SACH, mak ing it
more convenient for
patients to access
both hospitals. To
provide CGH patients
with seamless stepdown
care, doc tors
from CGH’s Or thopaedic and G eriatric Medicine
depar tments also do ward rounds at SACH with SACH
doc tors.
L aunch of CHAMPS
CGH launched the Community Health Ambassador
Programme for S eniors, or CHAMPS, on Sept 3, 2005.
The programme, a par tnership with the M inistr y of
Community D evelopment, Youth and Spor ts, seeks
to empower ac tive elderly volunteers with basic
healthcare sk ills. More than 120 par ticipants have
learnt to do simple health monitoring, including
the use of the Snellen’s Char t for monitoring vision
acuity in the elderly, administering pin-prick tests to
measure blood glucose and identifying elderly folks
who are at risk of falls.
COMMITMENT
TRaCS and IWork health
COLLABORATION
New Neighbours
CGH welcomed two new neighbours in Simei in
2005 – the Simei Care Centre and the Saint Andrew ’s
Community Hospital (SACH). SACH is the first
community hospital to be located nex t to an acute-care
CGH launched Trauma Recover y & Corporate Solutions
( TR aCS) in April 2005 to improve work place mental
health and the management of traumatic incidents.
Under the programme, employees are provided with
consultation, training and psychological suppor t
in crisis management and the treatment of posttraumatic
stress disorder.
Stress is a constant feature in a fast-paced society
like Singapore. To help employees manage stress, it is

SingHealth Annual Repor t 2005
impor tant to gauge their stress levels, general health
and perceptions of their work environment. Such an
assessment is now available, thanks to a collaboration
that involves CGH, M inistr y of M anpower, SATA,
Health Promotion Board and the Civil S er vice College
(CSC). The iWorkHealth Corporate Assessment Tool is
an online tool for employees, and comprises a basic
version, iWorkHealth, and a comprehensive version,
iWorkHealth Plus.
audits healthcare organisations worldwide and is
dedicated to improving the safety and quality of
healthcare.
Business Continuity Management Cer tificate
CGH was awarded the Business Continuity
M anagement Cer tificate by SPRING Singapore on Dec
15, 2005, in recognition of the hospital’s commitment
to provide critical and essential business func tions
to patients in the midst of a crisis.
Awards for CGH
HomeCare Assist, a programme star ted by CGH in 2002 to provide
financial help to needy patients, won the Most Outstanding
Community S er vice Projec t award at the Asian Hospital
M anagement Awards 2005.
CGH was also awarded the Best Work-Life Balance Prac tices
Award at the HRM Awards in March 2005.
CGH was recognised for Leading HR Prac tices in Balanced Work-
Life at the Singapore HR Awards in June 2005.
Awards for CGH Staff
Dr Hsu Pon Poh, Consultant ENT surgeon and Head of Clinical
Trials and Research Unit, was awarded the 10th Yahya Cohen
M emorial Lec tureship by the College of Surgeons, Singapore, on
July 3, 2005, for his paper, “Clinical Predic tors in Obstruc tive Sleep
Apnoea (OSA) Patients with Computer Assisted Quantitative
V ideoendoscopic Upper Air way Analysis”.
M edical Social Worker Judy S eow and S enior Staff Nurse Beh G aik
Ping received the Healthcare Humanity Awards from President S
R Nathan on Aug 20, 2005.
TCM Clinic at CGH
To cater to patients who seek Traditional Chinese
M edicine ( TCM) treatment, a 3,000-sq-f t TCM Clinic
was set up at the CGH Wards Lobby, Level 1. The
Singapore Chung Hwa M edical Institution runs the
independent outpatient facility offering acupunc ture,
moxibustion and tuina ser vices.
CERTIFICATIONS AND AWARDS
JCI Accreditation
CGH received the stringent Joint Commission
International ( JCI) accreditation on June 11, 2005.
The accreditation is an international endorsement
awarded by the JCI, an independent agenc y that
FY 05 FY 04
Size (as at end March)
Bed Complement 776 797
Beds in Ser vice 696 679
Work load per annum
Bed Occupanc y R ate 86.3% 84.3%
Inpatient Admissions 40,623 41,996
Inpatient Discharges 40,645 42,003
Total Patient Days 219,421 208,949
Average Length of Stay 5.4 5.0
Total Surgical Operations 34,405 34,192
Day Surgeries 18,098 18,949
Inpatient Surgeries 16,307 15,243
Specialist Outpatient Attendances 314,224 309,498
Accident & Emergenc y Attendances 138,512 132,957
Staffing (as at end March)
Total 2,233 2,141
D oc tors 280 280
Nurses 938 908
Health Sciences Professionals 260 255
O thers 756 698