?South-West Re­gion­al Health Au­thor­i­ty says mem­bers of the pub­lic liv­ing in South Trinidad should ac­cess ser­vices at San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal on­ly for life-threat­en­ing ac­ci­dents/in­ci­dents or emer­gen­cies. The in­sti­tu­tion said dur­ing the past 24 hours there were in­stances of over­crowd­ing at San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal. It said sev­er­al mea­sures were put in place to mit­i­gate this prob­lem, in­clud­ing en­hance­ment of the dis­charge process and the pro­vi­sion of ad­di­tion­al meals for pa­tients on ad­mit­ting wards. The re­lease said the pub­lic should use the dis­trict health fa­cil­i­ties and health cen­tres where ap­pro­pri­ate. The dis­trict health fa­cil­i­ties at Cou­va and Princes Town pro­vid­ed 24-hour emer­gency ser­vices and gen­er­al prac­tice ser­vices and would be op­er­a­tional on Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day.

In a news re­lease the au­thor­i­ty said per­sons should seek at­ten­tion at the in­sti­tu­tion on­ly for the fol­low­ing:

1. Mo­tor ve­hi­cle ac­ci­dents

2. Gun­shot or chop wounds

3. Se­vere bleed­ing

4. Asth­mat­ic at­tacks

5. Al­ler­gic re­ac­tions

6. Se­vere chest pain

7. Near drown­ing

8. Falls or blows to the head

9. High fever in ba­bies and tod­dlers

10. Ex­ces­sive vom­it­ing in adults and chil­dren

11. Se­vere ab­dom­i­nal pain

12. Se­vere burns

13. Over­dose of pills

14. In­ges­tion of tox­ic sub­stance.

Health cen­tres will be opened Mon­day to Fri­day, gen­er­al­ly from 8 am 4 pm and pro­vide treat­ment of com­mon dis­eases and in­jury and ba­sic emer­gency ser­vices. On Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day, all health cen­tres will be open from 8 am to 4 pm with the ex­cep­tion of Roy Joseph Health Cen­tre, San Fer­nan­do, which will be closed. The fol­low­ing health cen­tres will be opened from 8 am to 12 noon:

?1. Clax­ton Bay

2. Debe Health

3. Gas­par­il­lo

4. In­di­an Walk

5. La Ro­maine

6. Lengua

7. Mara­bel­la

8. Moru­ga

9. Rochard Dou­glas

10. Ste Madeleine n Williamsville