The Department of Health (DOH) announced on Friday that 28 Bagong Urgent Care and Ambulatory Service (BUCAS) centers are now ready to undertake Filipinos' "ambulatory medical and surgical care needs."
"So, immediately after we launched the first one on March 6, we now have 28 all over the country and that was my initial goal. I only wanted to build 28 BUCAS centers for the 28 million poor. Of course it’s not enough but I wanted to start," Health Secretary Teodoro Herbosa explained in the Malacañang Insider Program.
Aside from having been brought up in President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.'s third State of the Nation Address (SONA), the BUCAS initiative will also be funded by lawmakers.
"But because it was a success, it even got to the SONA of the President. And he mentioned it there. So happy that he mentioned it. Now, I came from Congress and they want to fund our BUCAS centers," he disclosed.
The BUCAS centers are "like a hospital without beds," Herbosa said, and open from 6 AM to 10 PM. This late outpatient service is what has made these centers popular.
"So, why it became a hit? It’s that, before, if you’re [a] working person, by the time you end work and you want to bring your child to the hospital, the outpatient service is close[d]. But the BUCAS is open until 10 PM. So you’ll get home at 5 PM. You see your child is sick, you bring them to the BUCAS center," he elaborated.
The centers offer general surgery, oral-maxillofacial surgery, otorhinolaryngologic surgery, reproductive health services, and laboratory services with "comprehensive diagnostic capabilities."
