NEPTUNE FEATURE: The sad state of University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital (Photos)
Story from Rakiya MOHAMMED
University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital, (UMTH) once known to be a centre of excellence was opened with all facilities functioning to standard and seasoned health workers manning affairs, the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital (UMTH) in Maiduguri, northeastern Nigeria used to be like a hospitality centre and patients’ delight following its establishment many years ago.
But all that is now history. The teaching hospital then reputed to be a centre of excellence and pride of the University has now turned into a mosquito breeding ground and cholera and infectious disease distributors, it has been in a dilapidated and terrible condition over the years. The toilets with no water stink and overflowing from the inside with many sewage wide open and dirt taking over because salaries of both its security, porters and cleaners have not been paid for a year.
Where is Servicom and how did our Centre of Excellence degenerate to this extent? one may be tempted to ask. The hospital consists of the best in everything but our best is now the over-bloated professors and consultants who have abandoned their humanitarian calling of tending patients.
From the maternity clinic, you can hear the people murmuring that after paying N7000 as consultancy fee anytime they go to the clinic, they would have to give N500 to see a doctor and also pay through their nose for other services as small as urine test which used to be done free then.
Now if you’re a patient on admission, the doctors will subject you to all manner of tests just as a way of enhancing the revenue generation or enriching their pockets, not minding the situation in Maiduguri and once on admission you would have to expect all manner of doctors and other health workers, and each time they come they give you a long list of drugs they don’t have and subject you to irrelevant tests.
If you happen to go to the pharmacy to buy drugs you would hear the staff saying that the drugs are out of stock and when you probe further they tell you the suppliers don’t supply because the hospital still owes a huge debt and can no longer buy drugs so even at midnight you have to go across the road to buy drugs from a retail shop which is cheaper.
The worst set of the UMTH staff are those you meet first at the medical records office, who, if you’re not lucky will look you up and continue talking on their phone for hours nonstop, not caring whether you’re in an emergency. with this attitude, they have frustrated so many patients.
Despite the beautiful edifice constructed by the government and some very few facilities donated by non-governmental organisations (NGOs), the hospital is not taking care of the facilities at their disposal. Coming to the caregivers, that’s the nurses, they’ve forgotten their first calling and abandoned the nursing care, they’re harsh and nonchalant in their manner of attending to people.
Worst still, the non-indigenous nurses only show care to their kin who speak their language, and even the non-indigenous doctors are equally guilty of the unethical practice.
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 University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital, (UMTH) once){kind=link}