More than 2,300 volunteers signed up for the Office of the Vice President’s (OVP) bayanihan (communal spirit) e-konsulta program, which aims to set up an e-consultation system for patients within the National Capital Region Plus (NCR Plus) bubble.
The program aims to decongest the surge of patients in hospitals and clinics, Vice President Leni Robredo said.
In a Facebook post, the vice president announced that they were “temporarily closing our sign-ups as we bring everyone on board for our project rollout.”
“24 hours after we posted our call for medical and non-medical volunteers, more than 2,300 volunteers signed up already! We are overwhelmed and inspired by everyone’s kindness and desire to be of help,” she said Wednesday, April 7.
The program is meant to “fill in gaps,” Robredo stated, adding that “we expect it to be evolving and we want to manage it in the best way we can.”
But to those who still have plans to join but have not signed up yet, the lady official asked them to “stay tuned for further announcements.”
The OVP also plans to officially launch its e-konsulta Facebook page by Wednesday noon.
On Monday, April 5, Robredo called for volunteer doctors and phone operators to set up its e-konsulta program to make outpatient consultation available for those who do not have access to doctors and hospitals.
The doctors must be “available to do phone consultations for outpatient cases within NCR and surrounding areas covered by the ECQ” while the telephone operators “will receive and process requests concerning outpatient cases residing in NCR and surrounding areas covered by the ECQ and match them with volunteer doctors for phone consultations.”
Robredo earlier said the program hopes to answer the calls of many on social media about patients not being able to find a hospital that can accommodate them because the facilities in NCR reached full capacity.
Reports on social media said that some families from Metro Manila drive as far as Sorsogon to find a hospital for their loved ones.
The surge in COVID-19 cases is overwhelming hospitals as even non-COVID-19 patients are now having a hard time finding a hospital that can accommodate them. This is despite the fact that the Department of Health (DOH) maintains the hospital utilization rate in NCR for intensive care units (ICU) is only around 79 percent.