Oman's health ministry develops Health Vision 2050

Muscat: Oman’s long term healthcare plan “Health Vision 2050,” which is a transit stage for the health system to ensure that it is in line with the world medical and technological developments, has been developed, according to a Ministry of Health’s report.
The report pointed out that the healthcare system in the Sultanate consists of three integrated levels namely the primary, the secondary and the tertiary level.
The primary health care level is the effective and high quality level provided by the health centres, polyclinics and hospitals that cover all areas in the Sultanate.
The secondary health care level is provided by the referral hospitals in the governorates, as well as the hospitals in the wilayats. They provide healthcare services for specialised health problems. They provide more specialised healthcare than the primary healthcare.
The tertiary healthcare level is the high-tech specialised services provided by major hospitals, like the Royal, Khoula, Al Nahda and Al Masarah hospitals. At present, the number of hospitals in the Sultanate has reached 69 and 49 of them are affiliated to the Ministry of Health.
The number of beds in all these hospitals stands at 6,468 which works out to 15.5 beds per 10,000 people. Of these, 4,998 beds or 77 per cent are affiliated to the Ministry’s hospitals. 326,000 in patients received treatments in 2015. About 102,000 surgical operations were conducted in 2015.
The report added that the Ministry expanded the number of primary healthcare institutions at the different governorates and enhanced their development to ensure providing high quality primary healthcare. By the end of 2015, the number of health centers, complexes and local hospitals managed by the Ministry of Health stood at 235.
The report further said that as per world class standards, the Sultanate is one of the leading countries in terms of improving lives of its population.
The Sultanate ranked high in terms of maintaining lives of children, thanks to the expanded vaccination programme, which targeted several diseases, such as TB, severe meningitis (polio), diphtheria, whopping cough, tetanus and measles.
The report pointed out also that a number of vaccines against hepatitis, German measles, mumps, hemophilia influenza, polio injections were added to the current vaccines. The Sultanate also remained free of polio for the 16th successive years, thanks to almost 100 per cent polio vaccination rates. The number of children below five years of age with severe respiratory tract infection increased from 1239 in 2010 to 1383 per 1000 children below five years of age in 2015 due to the spread of some infectious diseases.