Transformation in the health sector.

[FMINigeria]

By Lawrence Anneth I. N.

In the recent past, wealthy Nigerians take pride in seeking medical attention outside the country not minding the cost or the level of treatment; as it is said health is wealth.

However, this medical tourism is not so desired, as Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu, the Minister of Health puts it, because many of those who went abroad for medical attention were treated in private hospitals, not the foreign government-established, reputable ones.

The Federal Government in view of this mapped out strategies to reduce outward medical tourism and these strategies have been transforming the health sector.

There is no doubt that Nigerians need specialized hospitals that can cater for their health needs. This is why the present Government choose to set up a ministerial committee for under locking private sector potentials for the establishment of world class specialist hospital and high-end diagnostic centres, here in Nigeria.

Also, the decision to have a transformed public-private sector driven health sector in Nigeria is informed by a need to curtail the capital flight and brain drain which an underdeveloped health sector portends for the country.

In itemising what the Government has been doing to transform the health sector, Prof. Onyebuchi Chukwu disclosed at the Ministerial platform for accounting for achievements of the present administration that the Federal Government commissioned and rehabilitated some medical projects like the Federal Neuro-Psychiatric Hospital in Kaduna and Calabar; new respiratory intensive care unit at the University of Abuja Teaching Hospital, Gwagwalada, among others.

Sickle-cell anaemia patients in the country can now heave a sigh of relief as the University of Benin Teaching Hospital recorded a breakthrough recently in the infusion of stem cells into a sickle cell anaemic patient and it was successful.

This means that Nigerians can now access health delivery for sickle cell disease. A dedicated ward for haematology and haematic-oncology has been opened at University of Benin Teaching Hospital.

A lot of Nigerians have been exposed to dangerous life style. Probably this is why the disastrous sickness – cancer has been rampaging everywhere to the extent that even children now suffer from cancer. The truth in the saying that prevention is better than cure possibly informed why the Ministry of Health established screening centres for cancer especially in the areas of breast, cervix, and prostrate. The centres for this screening are Federal medical centres in Gusau, Keffi, Ebute-Metta, Portharcourt, Abakaliki and Bauchi.

One of the reasons why Nigerians seek medical attention outside the country is their quest to treat kidney or renal failures which most times, require transplanting – a surgical procedure performed to replace a diseased kidney with a healthy one from a donor. Today, we are singing a new song as it is possible to have transplants done in Nigeria. There are centres that have the capability to do renal transplanting and they include amongst others, Lagos University Teaching Hospital, University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital and a private Hospital, St Nicolas in Lagos. It was in the public domain that these three hospitals successfully carried out kidney transplants in 2012.

Under President Jonathan's dispensation, many of Nigeria's healthcare facilities were upgraded to international centres of excellence. The Federal Medical Centre at Gombe as well as Obafemi Awolowo University Teaching Hospital, Ile-Ife have commenced laparoscopic surgery – that is, the performance of surgical procedures with the assistance of a video-camera and several thin instruments.

The Ministry of Health has introduced the use of CCTV assisted monitoring gadgets at University of Benin Teaching Hospital in the burns and plastic surgery intensive care unit.

The centre of excellence for heart disease at the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital has been refurbished and it has resumed open heart surgery after eight years. In Federal Medical Centre, Umuahia, microsurgery of the brain is now being conducted there. Total knee and hip replacement can be done at our orthopaedic hospitals in Enugu and Igbobi, Lagos State, the Federal Medical Centre Yenagoa and University of Benin Teaching Hospital.

In the North, a lot of children and adults who were hitherto being ravaged by polio meningitis have got attention as government has doubled the funding of polio eradication activities to N4.7 Billion in 2013, and a further commitment of N2.5 billion.

Given all the above mentioned, what else can we ask for? All these are being done to ensure that the number of Nigerians going outside the country for medical treatment is reduced to a minimal level, and funds saved. As well, they are being put in place for all Nigeria's-rich and poor, to be able to access effective treatment within the nation at affordable prices.

Lawrence Anneth I. N. wrote in from the National Press Centre, Abuja.

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