MONTEGO BAY, St James – Clinical coordinator for the Western Regional Health Authority (WRHA) Dr Delroy Fray has said that the recent work to remove mould at the Cornwall Regional Hospital (CRH) has been completed.

Dr Fray, who spoke to the Jamaica Observer during a recent tour of the health facility, said that the mould was identified approximately two weeks ago. It was initially believed that the mould was located inside an operating theatre at the facility, but Dr Fray said that, that was not true.

He said that the mould was found in the vicinity of the two small operating theatres being used by the Type A facility.

“The mould issue that was identified was in the passageway. Once we identified it, our people checked it, and what we found was that it was in the air conditioner duct that we had mould,” Dr Fray told the Sunday Observer.

The issue with the mould saw both operating theatres being closed and the hospital only being able to cater to emergency operations from a small theatre at the Accident and Emergency Unit (A&E). While the majority of elective operations were curtailed, some patients requiring these services were transported from the St James-based facility to Falmouth General Public Hospital for surgeries and then back for aftercare.

Dr Fray told the Sunday Observer that both theatres at CRH were being refurbished. It is expected that they will be in operation by Wednesday morning.

“The AC ducts have been removed and replaced so there is no issue with mould here now and that is why we are able to expeditiously move up our refurbishing in order to have them handed over to us by the end of the month,” said Dr Fray.

In the meantime, the clinical coordinator explained that though some elective surgeries were curtailed over the last two weeks, the facility was able to maintain a level of normality through the work done at Falmouth Public General Hospital and the privately run Montego Bay Hospital.

“Our current status with operating services at the Cornwall Regional Hospital is that we are using two operating theatres at the Falmouth Hospital and we have a small area in the Accident and Emergency Unity (A&E) at CRH for emergency services only,” Dr Fray maintained.

He continued, “If it happens that we need more than two operating theatres for emergency services, we have an arrangement with our neighbour, Montego Bay Hospital, to use that area. In fact, we tested it about two weeks ago when we had a Caesarean section, and at the same time we had a gunshot wound come in and we had to move the patient across there.”

Since 2017 the 10-storey, 400-bed capacity hospital has been undergoing $14.1-billion worth of rehabilitation. The rehabilitation project has caused the hospital’s operations to be carried out from the nurses’ and doctors’ quarters instead of the main building. It was reported that concerns over the facility’s indoor air quality, dating back to 2009, played a major role in the temporary closure of the main building. It was during that time that a partnership was forged with the Falmouth Hospital to assist in conducting surgeries, as CRH is the only Type A facility in the western region.

Dr Fray further told the Sunday Observer that health practitioners at CRH will also be able to effectively respond to patients with the addition of two operating theatres at the Falmouth General Public Hospital. That, he said, would help, as they aim to cut down on the backlog caused by the mould infestation.

“Now the good news is that by the end of this month two more operating theatres will be made available at the Falmouth Hospital, so we will have a total of four there, and at Cornwall Regional Hospital, those two small theatres that are currently being refurbished will be handed to us. So by the beginning of November we will have six operating theatres and that small area at A&E,” Dr Fray said.