The Overseas Filipino Workers Hospital (OFWH), which provides medical assistance and services to more than 86,000 OFWs and their dependents in 2024, has increased its services this year by opening facilities and treatment for dread diseases like cancer and chronic kidney ailment.
Camarines Sur Rep. Luis Raymund Villafuerte said, “This OFW Hospital of our DMW (Department of Migrant Workers) that served more than 86,000 of our OFWs and their families in 2024 alone has certainly upped its game this year in putting up facilities for treating our migrant workers and their qualified family members with cancer or kidney disease.”
Villafuerte, a lead author of a House-approved bill enabling this facility to hire foreign or local specialists or medical experts to treat its patients, added: “Our senators can help our OFW Hospital take its game to the next level by passing before the end of the 19th Congress a counterpart bill to HB (House Bill No.) 8325 enabling the DOH (Department of Health) to sign up medical specialists to treat OFWs and their families at the OFWH.”
HB 8325, which the House passed on third and final reading in May 2023 yet, tasks the DOH to tap cardiologists, pulmonologists, nephrologists, and other medical specialists to hold clinics and treat migrant Filipinos and their families at this specialty hospital based in the City of San Fernando in Pampanga.
Moreover, this bill authorizes the OFWH to invite foreign experts in fields not readily available in the country to hold clinics and treat patients in the facility, and to send its personnel to research or medical institutes for advance healthcare training and to attend international or local conferences and seminars, subject to the DMW’s approval.
The OFWH also put up packages for Pre-Employment Medical Examination for would-be OFWs, and the Medical Assistance and Medical Repatriation Program for repatriated OFWs.