For Dr Bien Nillos, being healthcare provider in an environment with limited resources is a challenge. As part of Doctors to the Barrios (DTTB) Batch 23, Nillos was assigned as municipal health officer in Candoni, Negros Occidental, from 2007 to 2009, serving around 27,000 people scattered across a wide area which only has a small dilapidated rural health unit.
Though Nillos is accompanied by a public health nurse and 9 barangay midwives, enough based on the ratio (one nurse per 20,000 and 1 midwife per 5,000), the fact that his area is far-flung and in a very mountainous region means it is not that relevant. “I had to ask from the mayor more midwives and nurses to help run our night emergency clinic and, later, our birthing clinic, which operated 24/7. It was a tough negotiation because the town, being a fourth-class municipality, could not simply afford to hirethem.” |
