The announcement that has been posted on the official Web site reads, “The health care office closes down from Nov. 23. Residents are required to prepare household medicine. If anyone has a medical emergency, please call the office.”
“I was confused when I first read the announcement,” said Jung Yeo-jin (Business, 1), a Ewha Dormitory resident. “It made me wonder why the dormitory did not provide a thorough explanation as it is a serious issue for the residents.”
Ewha Dormitory explains that it had continuously experienced problems in operating the health care office for three to four years because less and less nurse-certificated graduate students applied for the job.
“As the job requires working from 7:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. at night to run the health care office, it needs a shift,” said Lee Duck-kyu, the associate director of the Ewha Dormitory. “However, recently the difficulties in finding assistants lead to having only one person to work. She ended up quitting due to personal reasons, leaving the health care office to close down.”
Students also insisted that there was no measure or solution to cope with the sudden change. Instead of proposing specific measures that could cover the closure of the health care office, the dormitory announced that the residents should prepare their own household medicines. Many of the residents consider this action irresponsible.
“Since most residents live far away from Seoul, the dormitory should pay closer attention to our health,” Lim Young-jin (Computer & Electronics Engineering, 1) said. “Any medical situation can happen in the dormitory, and I feel vulnerable to those possibilities because of the closure.”
Recognizing such inconveniences that the residents would experience, Ewha Dormitory surveyed 10 major universities’ dormitories over the health care system; none of them operates an office but instead provides household medicines or calls 119 in case of medical emergencies. Ewha Dormitory is planning to follow these countermeasures following the health care office closure.
“Two of Ewha Dormitory’s Residence Tutors are certificated nurses, and they are on duty from 4:30 p.m. to 9:00 a.m. the next morning,” Lee said. “The office prepares basic household medicines and is ready to call 119 when an emergency happens. We try to set up a system that can minimize the potential dangers and residents’ concerns.”
However, due to the potential misusage of the medicine, Ewha Dormitory recommends the residents to prepare their own medicines with the consult of a pharmacist or a doctor.
Ewha Dormitory has no further plan in reopening the health care office after this semester.
Chung Che-yoon
thfl353@ewhain.net