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{
    "id": 594356,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/594356/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 169,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Hon. (Dr.) Pukose",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 1458,
        "legal_name": "Robert Pukose",
        "slug": "robert-pukose"
    },
    "content": "Thank you, Hon. Temporary Deputy Speaker for allowing me to contribute to this Bill. First, I want to thank Hon. Agostinho Neto for the effort he has put into this Bill. As a Member of the Departmental Committee on Health and the health profession, the Bill has good intentions but will need a lot of amendments. When you say that you will establish a board for the health records and information managers, then the issue of budget comes in. How are you going to finance it? The Bill establishes that the board will be able to recruit its staff. When you recruit staff, how will you pay them? Where will you get the money from? Is it a money Bill? That is why it requires that the National Treasury, together with the Budget and Appropriations Committee, looks at it to see how we will finance this board. Some time back, the Government also established a ministerial committee to look at the rationalisation of the parastatals. When we establish this board, it will mean that we will be increasing our wage bill. Currently, many of the functions that we are talking about affect the county governments, because many of the health records officers are working under the county governments. These are the challenges that will also come with the Bill. When you talk about the composition of the board, you talk of some of the members being from the private sector. Do we currently have a private practice in terms of health records and information? No. When you are a health records and information manager or officer, what will you be doing when you establish an office for health records and information? This information is required at both the county and national levels for various categories, of maybe diseases, records of how the various profiles of the various individuals are being carried out. When you say you are going to establish an office as a health records information officer, what are you going to do? Who is going to come to your office to seek that kind of information? When you talk of information that is kept as health records, this is supposed to be guarded information because it is sensitive information that can be shared through various channels in the ministry. So, when it comes to private practice, it is going to be challenging. If somebody is going to engage in private practice, will it be sustainable? What kind of clients are you going to target, so that you can sustain yourself and apply for the licences? The areas that are good include training and regulation of officers. That is very important but health records information managers are supposed to assist the various cadres. These are support staff when it comes to healthcare. They are supposed to provide supportive services. From that perspective, when it comes to colleges such as the Kenya Medical Training College (KMTC) and other institutions that may want to train health records and information officers and ensure that we have standards, morals and ethics maintained, that is where the role of--- It could be done by an association of officers of this cadre. However, one of the dangers that we must prevent is that everybody will now want to have their board. We will have several boards for health records information officers, medical engineers, oral health officers, occupational therapists and all the other cadres in the medical profession, which is both a national and county function; you will have so many boards that their sustainability will be a problem. The electronic version of the Official Hansard Report is for information purposesonly. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor."
}