Courtar: Healthcare standards on Caribbean islands need stronger foundation

ORANJESTAD, St. Eustatius – Healthcare on the Caribbean islands needs a stronger foundation before equal standards with the European Netherlands can be achieved, according to Dr. Dorette Courtar, healthcare provider on St. Eustatius and member of the ZonMw Caribbean Health Research programme committee.

In an interview published by ZonMw, Courtar says that particularly on Saba, St. Eustatius and St. Maarten, shortages of expertise and insufficient cooperation remain major obstacles. While funding and information are provided from the Netherlands, she argues that too little expertise is available locally or applied effectively.

Foundation needs to be equal

Courtar also questions whether the basic conditions needed to guarantee quality of care are sufficiently established. She points, among other things, to differences in professional registration and continuing education requirements. “If you talk about equal quality, you at least have to make the foundation equal,” she says.

According to Courtar, the small scale of the islands should not be a reason for accepting shortcomings. “If this were happening in a town in the Netherlands, it would be unacceptable,” she says. Programmes intended to improve healthcare and lifestyles can also fail simply because the necessary specialists are not available on the islands.

More research needed

Dr. Courtar also calls for more independent and locally based research into how the healthcare systems themselves function, rather than focusing only on individual medical research projects. Courtar says people on the islands should also be able to discuss shortcomings in healthcare openly without criticism immediately becoming politically or personally sensitive.

Ultimately, she argues, there needs to be a clear long-term ambition for healthcare throughout the Kingdom. Her goal is that the quality of care should not depend on whether someone visits a doctor in the Netherlands or in the Caribbean.

⁠Read the full interview with Dr. Dorette Courtar on ZonMw