Norway`s Red Cross is providing Rp15 billion of Rp18 billion needed to build much-needed facilities at Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam (NAD)`s Mental Hospital, NAD Deputy Governor Muhammad Nazar said.
The start of construction of the facilties was marked by a first corner-stone laying ceremony led by Nazar in the company of NAD Mental Hospital Director Saifuddin Abdurahman here Tuesday.
The facilities to be set up with the Norwegian Red Cross funds were four treatment wards, a kitchen, an emergency building (UGD), a warehouse and a two-storey administrative building.
After the Norwegian-supported facilities had been completed, a number of other facilities needed to be built or renovated.
“After the NAD administration is able to provide the needed funds, all the asylum`s facitlities will hopefully be completed by the end of 2010 and then the hospital will really be in the condition according to the site plan,” he said.
In 2010, the asylum was also expected to undergo a face-lift which would make conditions in the hospital so comfortable that even mentally healthy people would find it an attractive place to stay in, he said.
He said the NAD mental hospital was now accommodating 350 patients compared to its capacity of 220 patients, and thus the bed occupancy rate reached more than 100 percent.
“This is not right as the ideal bed occupancy is 70-80 percent, so the aid from Norway`s Red Cross meets the need,” he said.
Besides, his side was also trying to improve the hospital`s services and performance by, among other things, sending 36 nurses to the Semarang mental hospital for an internship program.
Apart from that, three doctors were studying to become specialists, 23 staff members were studying for their nursing degree at University of Indonesia and Syiah Kuala University, Banda Aceh, he said.
On the occasion, Nazar, on behalf of the Aceh provincial administration, expresed many thanks to Norway`s government for providing its assistance for the building the new facilities which, he said, would enable the hospital to improve its services to the mentally ill.
