|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Our parlous health system and the Yobe example, by Hassan Gimba
The Arbiter
In the last two editions of my write-up, I narrated my sojourn to Saudi Arabia, where I ended up at the Makkah Saudi-German Hospital, in search of Medicare.
After extolling the virtues and efficiency of the Saudi model, I asked the pertinent question of why we cannot replicate the model. I went as far as requesting state governors to build one each in their states and engage the Saudi-German Hospital to run it for them for some time.
It was just after the publication that I came across a statement by the Katsina State Governor, Dr Dikko Umar Radda, who said that his state, bar Yobe State, “Has gone very far in terms of health delivery”, is the best in Nigeria. I was impressed. A governor accepting that another state is better than his. In a BBC Hausa Interview programme named “A Fada A Cika”, he acknowledged that, saying in the North, the only state that Katsina can look up to in healthcare is Yobe.”
Then I came across Statisense’s research-based statement that only 14 states, Yobe inclusive, in Nigeria improved their care delivery capacity between 2016 and 2021.
Statisense is a pioneering and leading Nigerian AI data company specializing in financial report analysis, bank statement evaluation, and AI chatbot services.
This made me get in touch with the Chief Medical Director (CMD), of Yobe State University Teaching Hospital (YSUTH), Damaturu, Dr Baba Goni Waru, a young and humble chap with a brilliant mind. An Associate Professor at the University of Maiduguri, he has been a medical doctor for 26 years, 16 of which as a Consultant Physician and specialist in Infectious Diseases and Tropical Medicine.
READ ALSO: Needed: One standard hospital per state (1), by Hassan Gimba
He is also an experienced hospital manager and administrator, having been the Executive Secretary of Yobe State Hospitals Management Board between 2015 and 2016. In 2016, he was appointed as the CMD of the teaching hospital.
Having seen what makes a hospital a hospital in Saudi Arabia, I sought to know from him what distinguishes the hospital from its contemporaries based on the interventions of the government of Governor Mai Mala Buni since other Governors and reputable organisations are all giving him the thumbs up.
Dr Waru told me that, to begin with, free haemodialysis service for patients suffering from Chronic Kidney Failure at the YSUTH has been going on uninterruptedly throughout the five years Buni has been Governor, where about 600 sessions of free haemodialysis are done monthly. And because of this, he said the Governor recently increased the standing monthly payment for the free haemodialysis services at the teaching hospital by 100%, from ten million naira to twenty million naira. A reputable supplier, Nipro Nigeria Ltd, based in Lagos, provides consumables for free following a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the state government.
He further revealed that the governor sent a delegation from YSUTH and the Health sector in the state to the Urology and Nephrology Centre (UNC) at Mansoura, Arab Republic of Egypt, in 2019 for an MoU to commence Kidney transplant services at the teaching hospital.
Urology and Nephrology Centre, Mansoura, is a World Health Organisation-recognized international centre for training on kidney transplants. Prof Muhammad Ahmad Ghoneim, a renowned urologist of international repute and the pioneer director of the centre, carried out the first kidney transplant in the Middle East and Africa out at UNC Mansoura in 1973.
Governor Buni personally led a delegation to the UK last year for a collaborative visit to University College London, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the Francis Crick Institute in Central London for a research collaboration with the State Government and the Yobe State University particularly on research into the immediate and remote causes of the prevalent chronic kidney disease bedevilling some communities on the fringes of Komadugu river in the northern part of the state.
READ ALSO: Needed: One standard hospital per state (2), by Hassan Gimba
Dr Waru further told me that Governor Buni has built and equipped a 400-bed capacity Maternal and Paediatric Complex, the largest in the country at the YSUTH Damaturu. Commissioned last year, the complex has state-of-the-art modern equipment in terms of maternal, newborn and paediatric care. There is also a modern 30-bed capacity labour ward, modern theatre suites for gynaecological and obstetrics operations, special care newborn baby unit with phototherapy machines, special incubators for newborns, baby cots, multi-parameter monitors for newborn babies, ultrasound machines, central surgical sterilization department. Etc. and to boot, all maternity cases are free while children from the age of one day to five years and accident victims are treated free.
There are also no issues of power, according to the CMD as there is a 24/7 Power backup for the new complex apart from a dedicated line from the National Grid. There are four 800 KVA generator sets, a one-megawatt solar power supply, high-yield capacity boreholes, 24/7 outsourced cleaning and security services, etc.
In terms of human resources, one of the tripodal factors that make a hospital world-class, I was told that Governor Buni had employed about 25 senior consultants and clinical lecturers to provide services and training at the new maternity and paediatric complex and the medical college as well. He also employed more than 300 other healthcare professionals including junior and middle cadre doctors, nurses, midwives, pharmacists, laboratory scientists and technicians, health information management staff, ICT staff, hospital assistants/janitors, etc.
Another tripod that makes a hospital is equipment. We have listed others earlier, however, other state-of-the-art equipment at the YSUTH is the latest MRI machine in town, the 1.5 Tesla Canon MRI Machine in the Radiology Department, 164-slides modern Toshiba CT scanning machine, digital x-ray machines, 3D and 4D ultrasound scanners, C-arm x-ray machines, mobile x-ray machines, modern Mammography machine for screening of breast cancer in women, etc.
To sustain the hospital needs training of those who will work, learn and eventually take over from tired hands. The establishment of a College of Medical Sciences at Yobe State University will result in the production of the first set of graduates and indigenous medical doctors within the next 2-3 years. Apart from medicine, other professional courses offered at the college include BSc Physiotherapy while Bachelor of Nursing Sciences, Bachelor of Medical Laboratory Sciences and BSc Medical Radiography, will soon be started.
Even though the Government of Mai Mala Buni continues to offer the third pivotal tripod – finance – that keeps greasing the wheel of success at the Yobe State Teaching Hospital, that makes people from all over the country now come there for medical attention, he intends to encourage indigenous medical professionals to form a body and partner with the government by taking over the growing teaching hospital.
This model, as developed by the Buni administration, is noble and worth adopting throughout the country.
Hassan Gimba is the Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Neptune Prime.
Follow the Neptune Prime channel on WhatsApp: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029Va74ZvU2v1IqKByXoX3d
Do you have breaking news, interview request, opinion, suggestion, or want your event covered? Email us at neptuneprime2233@gmail.com
It gladdens my heart to know that Yobe State has gone this far in terms of good healthcare delivery especially at the Yobe State University Teaching Hospital. I pray this is sustained and expanded to other hospitals in the state. Governor Mai Mala Buni has indeed set the pace, other states have less task in improving theirs as an example is already on ground.
(Dr.) Hassan Gimba is an illustrious son of Yobe, who always derive pleasure seeing the state moving forward. At every discussion one has with him, you will definitely understand that he has the state at heart. This week’s column has further demonstrated that. In fairness to him, he is the only one I’ve read that cares to tell the world these facts about Yobe. May Allah continue to bless Yobe with people like you.