Giving Traditional Chinese Medicine the recognition it
deserves
She spoke up, they listened... and said YES
By Clarence Chong
October 14, 2006
SHE was attending a Feedback Unit session for the first time in her
life.
Pacific Healthcare nursing home's operations manager, Ms Lim Chea
Ngo, with a colleague (extreme left) and patient.
Picture courtesy of MINISTRY OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT, YOUTH AND
SPORTS
She stood up, held her breath and walked to the microphone as
nearly a hundred pairs of eyes zeroed in on her.
Then she spoke up.
Why can't the Government give traditional Chinese medicine (TCM)
more credit?
Since TCM has been proven to work, and elderly patients,
especially, can benefit from it, isn't it time to allow
acupuncturists and other TCM practitioners to set up clinics in
nursing homes and hospitals?
Listening intently on stage was then Senior Minister of State for
Health, Dr Balaji Sadasivan.
His upfront reply: I think we should allow it.
Less than three months later, the policy was changed.
TCM services started to move into hospitals - side by side with
mainstream 'western' clinics - as well as nursing homes, saving
patients the cost and hassle of travelling via ambulance to get
their acupuncture treatment or traditional massage.
Ms Lim Chea Ngo, an 'ordinary citizen' and TCM aficionado, related
this happy-ever-after experience to The New Paper.
Declining to reveal her age, she is now an operations manager at
Pacific Healthcare nursing home in Bukit Merah.
Together with scores of doctors, nurses and health administrators,
Ms Lim had been invited by the Singapore Business Federation to
that eventful Sept 2005 dialogue session to discuss healthcare
policies.
'Of course, I don't expect the Government to implement every
suggestion,' she told The New Paper.
'But it's good that they're willing to listen to people on the
ground.
'It goes to show that policies CAN change - if you bring it up to
the right people and not complain, but show constructively how it
can make a difference in helping others.'
Ms Lim's 'pleasantly surprising' story was mentioned in a new
coffee table book called Your Views, Your Voice: A Feedback Journey
- launched by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong last night to
commemorate the Feedback Unit's 21st anniversary.
Before they got their way, Ms Lim and her fellow healthcare workers
had argued publicly for a change in TCM policy for nearly three
years at various health seminars.
But the MOH had always been reluctant to embrace TCM wholeheartedly
- due to the perceived lack of patient demand, the book pointed
out, and long-held doubts over TCM's effectiveness.
That is, until about a year ago.
Other Feedback Unit 'success stories' resulting in policy changes
over the years include:
Allowing singles aged above 35 to buy four-room and bigger HDB
resale flats
Implementing a five-day work week and 12 weeks' maternity
leave
Reserving a community space exclusively for youth activities in
Orchard Road
Preserving and saving Chek Jawa beach from reclamation
Giving the go-ahead to stage the controversial Body Worlds human
corpse exhibition and, most recently,
Allowing chronically-ill patients to use their Medisave to pay for
outpatient treatment.
The bottomline, PM Lee said, is that the Unit is not just an empty
'post box for complaints' or a black hole where public feedback is
sucked in and never sees the light of day.
'I hope Singaporeans also understand that good government cannot be
based on feedback alone.
'On nearly every issue, there will be a range of views and
ideas.
'Much as we would like to, it is impossible to make everyone
happy...
'But just because an opinion has not been accepted does not mean
that the process is unimportant,' he explained, saying that
consultation ultimately breeds consensus and active citizens.
That's why the agency, now renamed Reach (see report above), will
redouble its efforts to engage the silent majority and diversify
into youth-friendly 'new media' channels like blogs and SMS.
ELECTRONIC TOWNHALL
Also coming up on its revamped website (www.reach.gov.sg) by the
first quarter of next year: an electronic townhall where members of
the public can deliver their bouquets and brickbats straight to
policymakers via real-time webchats.
And although it already conducts some 50 dialogue sessions and
receives over 6,000 letters, e-mails and phone calls a year, Reach
will still go ahead and form 'citizen workgroups'.
The workgroups will comprise not government-appointed bureaucrats,
but heartlanders and ordinary Joes and Janes who will chair and
champion their own pet causes.
In other words, someone like Ms Lim.
