As part of its 183rd anniversary celebrations, the Guyana Police Force (GPF) on Thursday hosted a medical outreach at the Officers Training Centre at Camp Road, Eve Leary, Georgetown.
Guyana Police Association Chairman, Inspector Sewan Ramdat said that the event aimed at ensuring the well-being of ranks.
He related that the services offered at the outreach were also open to the Force’s sister agencies such as the Guyana Fire and Prison Services as well as the general public.
The Guyana Police Force’s medical outreach held at the Officers’ Training Centre
“We’re looking into the welfare of our ranks and this health fair is not only for the Guyana Police Force members, also the general public and all the sister organisations, like the Prison Service, the Army, the Fire Service. So, basically, we are looking out for our ranks and we decided to do something that can assist them during this special time for the Guyana Police Force,” he stated.
Inspector Ramdat further revealed that the Force was looking to have similar initiatives set up in all of the other administrative regions to ensure that all ranks benefit from these services.
Meanwhile speaking on the medical side of the initiative was the Coordinator of Elderly Health at the Health Ministry, Dr Melissa Dehart, who shared that a wide range of testing was offered at the event.
“We have a section for testing for any age of persons, whether it be diabetes, hypertension, you could have your weight tested as well, we have HIV testing available, we also have VIA testing for the females as well; we have blood donation that is going as well, so we have a variety of testing being done, prescribed medication as well and information on where you can follow up,” she stated.
The event also featured optical and dental services as well as the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines for all age cohorts, offering both primary and booster doses.
Mental health
Further, Dr Dehart related that the Ministry has recently placed more focus on mental health among the elderly, which was highlighted at the outreach on Thursday.
“It is a newly-established service so we’re trying to touch base with all factions, public health, institutional health, which includes all the elderly homes across Guyana of which there are many and additionally, we try to cover training for health staff on elderly care. Some of the main topics or the main aspects that we try to look at is mental care or mental health which includes Alzheimer’s, dementia and forgetfulness…we try to look at the physical and nutritional aspect of aging and let persons know that it’s different. We specify aging as over 60 so we want persons to know that all these aspects are different from when you’re over 60 compared to when you’re a working adult,” she explained.
“We are here mainly with educational material information on where they could have services, etc. We know that a lot of persons in the Force right are not considered elderly, but we’re aging as we go along and we want them to take this information to their parents, their elderly relatives, etc,” Dr Dehart added.
The outreach was held in collaboration with the Health Ministry, the Central Islamic Organisation of Guyana (CIOG) and other agencies.
