Dreaming of a healthier country

Manila, Philippines -  When life has gifted you with so much, you want to give back. The Makati Medical Center (MMC) Foundation, with a stellar “blue ribbon” board of trustees, is doing just that. Various meetings that spanned close to a year of preparation has given rise to a flagship program that is “trailblazing,” to quote Department of Health (DOH) Secretary Enrique T. Ona.

The MMC Foundation’s trustees continue to share precious time, valuable insights, and personal resources to assure the success of its flagship program. The MMC Foundation trustees include Manuel V. Pangilinan, chairman; Judy Araneta Roxas, vice chairperson; Dr. Victor L. Gisbert, MD, vice president; and Augusto P. Palisoc Jr., treasurer. Board members are Endika M. Aboitiz, Dr. Benjamin N. Alimurung MD, Tessie Sy Coson, Loida Nicolas Lewis, Susana A.S. Madrigal, Marixi R. Prieto, Angeles T. Quimson, Washington Z. Sycip, Ambassador Jesus P. Tambunting and Andrew L. Tan.

I sit as president of the MMC Foundation to keep the memory of Dr. Carlos L. Sevilla   alive and present in the hospital he loved and where he was one of the founders. Dr. Sevilla is my father and he lives forever in my heart.

Why is this program unique?

Simply because for the first time, private individuals, all-renowned in their respective fields and stalwarts in the world of business and the medical profession, have synergized with an established and respected hospital — the Makati Medical Center, your hospital with a heart — to form a flagship corporate social responsibility (CSR) program designed to help extend a hand to government hospitals, particularly in terms of organizational strengthening, enabling them to effectively service the many indigent patients that come to be healed.

In partnership with the First Pacific Leadership Academy (FPLA) and after an intensive six months of training and organizational diagnosis interventions, there will be a blueprint for effective, efficient and professional hospital management worked on by the hospital personnel themselves together with their facilitators, towards effectively managing and redesigning their existing structure. The objective being that they will now use government funding more efficiently because they will have the tools and templates to manage their hospitals in a quasi-corporate manner.

This is a PPP that differs slightly from the rest, whereby there will be no dole-outs from the partner foundation, nor any monies dispensed for structures, buildings, equipment and hardware. We opted to focus our resources on software and managing hospitals.

It is projected that by the end of the six months, the partner public hospital can come up with strategies in order to maximize its funds without needing any supplementary budgets or additional funding from either the national or the local government in order to be of service to its constituency. 

The MMC Foundation seeks to be the first to pioneer this type of partnership, in an effort to contribute to nation building and healthier Filipinos. National health, after all, is a national concern. Healthy Filipinos translate to a healthier Philippines.

The Makati Medical Center, under the leadership of its president Rose Montenegro, has expressed full support and will extend some financial, human and technical support to its CSR arm — the MMC Foundation. It brings with it the expertise, values and commitment of its entire team of medical staff and doctors, true to its mission of committing to support CSR initiatives within its community and the country.

What is the hospital of choice?

Today, an auspicious date being the birthdate of national hero Dr. Jose Rizal, the Rizal Medical Center located in the City of Pasig earns the distinction of being the first partner public hospital of the MMC Foundation for this pioneering flagship program.

The RMC met all the requirements set up by the board of trustees. Foremost, there had to be a “buy in” from the recipient hospital and its leaders. Full cooperation from both the hospital and the DOH was ensured, and there was much enthusiasm from Dr. Relito Saquilayan, medical director of RMC and his team, as well as from Dr. Teodoro Herbosa, DOH undersecretary for public-private partnerships, on behalf of DOH Secretary Dr. Enrique T. Ona.

The program’s sustainability and long-term commitment from the partner public hospital also had to be ensured. The RMC has a 300-bed capacity with an existing plantilla or positions with security of tenure for over 610 government doctors, nurses and staff. There, too, exist adequate DOH budget allocations for the hospital’s continued and successful operations.

Among the primary reasons that determined the choice was the “catchment” area of the Rizal Medical Center. It encompasses and reaches out to other cities and municipalities within NCR including Mandaluyong, Makati, Manila, Pasig, Antipolo and Taguig-Pateros and district hospitals of the province of Rizal. The benefits of an organizational strengthening program like this would be felt by a larger majority of the population that frequents the hospital.

MMC Foundation’s executive director, Marge Macasaet-Barro, assures that by Dec. 30, on the anniversary of the execution of Dr. Jose P. Rizal, program milestones and key result areas are met. Karen O. Torres, MMC program officer and an organizational diagnosis and training specialist, ensures that all training modules would also have been completed.

Ours is a work in progress, a PPP that still needs to be proven successful. But the MMC Foundation’s board of trustees feels it is worth more than just a try. It is our concrete share in nation building; a nation in need of a concerted effort between the government and the private sector. And when efforts to help are sincere and devoid of an agenda, especially when it is intended to help, rather than to gain, it can only succeed.

The MMC Foundation dares to take the first step towards a journey of a thousand more. It is a lofty dream, but it is a shared dream of a group of big-hearted philanthropists who have reached the pinnacle because they dared to dream. This flagship CSR program of the MMC Foundation is the translation of their combined effort towards fulfilling our dream of a healthier Philippines — the dream of every Filipino.