Ministry of National Guard – Health Affairs announced the Re-opening and full operation King Abdulaziz Medical City - Riyadh on Sunday, 4th of October, 2015 after the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome - Coronavirus (MERS-CoV) has been aggressively controlled, along with the completion of a quality comprehensive development plan in all sections and departments to gradually resume operations within the hospital, out-patient clinics and in-patients ward, with the participation of experts from the United States of America and United Kingdom in addition to focusing on infection control and patient flow in some departments. Moreover, the reopening of the Emergency Department will be within the next three weeks, due to the redesigning of the entrance and the development plan to direct patients between the clinics and the waiting areas along with a special path designated only for respiratory diseases. In regards to the previous appointments, a re-scheduling process of all out-patients clinics and operations is taking place in an orderly fashion to minimize the patient’s waiting time.
The temporary shutdown at the beginning of the MERS-CoV outbreak at King Abdulaziz Medical City - Riyadh, was one of the most important preventive and precautionary measures that have been applied to aggressively tackle the increasing numbers of infections. The Command and Control Center has issued some statements of which was closing the Emergency Department, setting up an integrated field hospital to screen and triage patients, the temporary suspension of elective surgical procedures as well as one-day operations and admission, while deploying alternative measures, including the transfer of urgent cases to other hospitals through coordination with the Ministry of Health hospitals and some private hospitals to provide urgent medical care. Other statements included the shutdown of several clinics except for high risk obstetric patients, chemotherapy patients, and valve therapy patients, in addition to carrying forward the pharmaceutical care services. Such measures have drastically contributed to reducing the transmission and the spread of this infection. Currently, the Command and Control Center is working around the clock to ensure the effectiveness of the infectious diseases epidemic plan, its evaluation and update according to the latest developments.
Among the effective decisions was forming a specialized committee from the Ministry of National Guard – Health Affairs along with inciting key international experts to work on reviewing and discuss the necessary plans for the re-opening of all the centers and the various medical departments to continue providing healthcare services for our respected patients.
Last but not least, the reopening was made possible thanks to the dedication and efforts of all employees who had one mission, to service patients and provide optimal medical care with the highest standards of quality and excellence, God willing.