Resource Upper West Regional Hospital - Hon. Sebastian Sandaare

The member of Parliament for the Daffiama Bussie Issa constituency has on Tuesday 29th June 2021 made a statement before Parliament calling for urgent attention in the need for the government to resource the Upper West Regional Hospital so as to provide quality healthcare in the region.

In his statement on the floor parliament, he indicated that, the building of the Upper West Regional Hospital has brought a great relief to the people of the Upper West region as numerous healthcare units which were not accessible are now available in the area.

Not withstanding the achievements, the hospital's ability to sustain its operational activities is a great challenge to the hospital because of the underlying factors he enumerated before the floor of Parliament.

The first challenge he stated is the lack of fund for the hospital to finance its operational activities. This has therefore resulted to the hospital operating on credit basis. 

Secondly, he said the hospital is also challenged by unstable power supply which he said can result in the damage of equipments in the hospital. He added that, this challenge renders effects on the lifespan of expensive hospital equipments and the inability of some equipments to be put to use.

Again, he said the hospital was also established without any official vehicles apart from the ambulance, even though it is important as a health facility of such to have some other vehicles beside the ambulance.

 He also talked about the lack of some critical health professionals in the Upper West Regional Hospital. He said even though the hospital has the various health care units, professionals are not available to work in those units. He also hammered on the need for the hospital to have a training facility.

 

Suggestions

Hon. Sebastian Sandaare also put before the house some suggestions to curb these challenges at the Upper West Regional Hospital. He calls on the minister for health with the ministry of finance to provide fund which he referred to in his statement as "seed capital" for the hospital to ensure efficiency in its operational activities.

Secondly, he calls on the minister of health, in corporation with the ministry of energy to enable the provision of a dedicated power line to restore the power inadequacies in the hospital.

He again calls on the minister of health to provide at least five vehicles for the hospital and finally they should attach a nursing training school to the Upper West Regional Hospital to ensure the training of more nurses to take up responsibilities at the facility.

He said if all these issues are taken into consideration, then the hospital will be able to provide quality healthcare to the people of the Upper West region and beyond.

Below is the full statement of Hon. Sebastian Sandaare:

RESOURCING THE UPPER WEST REGIONAL HOSPITAL TO PROVIDE QUALITY HEALTH CARE: THE NEED FOR URGENT ATTENTION – A STATEMENT MADE BY THE HON. MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT FOR DAFFIAMA-BUSSIE-ISSA CONSTITUENCY, DR SEBASTIAN N. SANDAARE.

Mr. Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to make this statement on the critical resource constraints confronting the newly commissioned Upper West Regional Hospital (UWRH). It is imperative because the situation has attendant adverse effects on the ability of the hospital to provide the requisite quality healthcare to the over 868,481 people of the Upper West Region and beyond.

Mr. Speaker, in pursuit of the need to provide access to quality secondary healthcare to bridge the existing access gap in the Upper West Region, the UWRH was commissioned on 9th January 2020 - 11 years after the sword was cut for the construction of the hospital. This brought great relief to the people of the Region as specialist care which was hitherto not accessible in areas of orthopaedic surgery, obstetric and gynaecological care, ophthalmic care, physiotherapy, Ear, Nose & Throat services, dental care, CT scan services and mammography have now been made available.

Notwithstanding these achievements Mr. Speaker, the hospital’s ability to sustain its operations is seriously threatened as a result of the foregoing;

1. Lack of seed capital or fund at the commencement of operations. Alien to conventions and best practices in the healthcare space, the UWRH was commissioned without any enabling funds to finance its start-up or operational activities. As a result, the health authorities in the region have had to finance the hospital’s operations on credit leaving it with an overwhelming and debilitating fiscal deficit. The situation is therefore affecting the hospital’s ability to sustain its operations and if the situation persists, the survival of the hospital will be threatened in the very near future.

2. Secondly Mr. Speaker, and very importantly, the hospital is challenged by unstable power supply which has the potential to damage or render ineffective the million-dollar equipment installed at the hospital. The situation is greatly affecting the functionality and lifespan of the equipment while other high level diagnostic equipment cannot be put to use. Expert advice from VRA/NEDCO indicates that the hospital requires a dedicated power line which is estimated at a cost of 1million Ghana cedis far beyond the financial ability of the health authorities in the Region.

3. Again Mr. Speaker, the hospital was established without any official vehicle besides the ambulance. However, it is well established that vehicles are a sine qua non to operations of health facilities of this calibre. It is in respect of the above that the peculiarity of the situation, that is, the failure to provide the hospital with a single vehicle unlike other hospitals beckons questions.

4. Furthermore Mr. Speaker, lack of some critical health professionals or specialists has also been identified as one of the greatest challenges confronting the UWRH. Though the hospital has provisions for specialities such as paediatrics, cardiology, neurology, urology and radiology among others, the units cannot be operationalised owing to the lack of these specialists. A full complement of secondary care requires these medical specialists to avert the situation of clients having to seek such specialist care in other regions with the attendant cost, risk and inconvenience.

5. Finally, Rt. Hon. Speaker, there exists a great untapped training potential at the hospital which should be taken advantage of. The establishment of the hospital comes with facilities for personnel training coupled with the specialists who would serve as tutors and preceptors. There is the opportunity to use the facility to train critical care nurses who are in short supply in the country.

Rt. Hon. Speaker, having espoused the challenges of the budding ultra-modern UWRH, I propose the following solutions to salvage the institution from the imminent threat of collapse. It is therefore recommended that;

1. The Minister for Health working with the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MOFEP) should make provision for the seed capital/fund, which is due the hospital, in the mid-year supplementary budget and subsequently provide same to the hospital in line with international best practices and requirements for start-up hospitals.

2. Secondly, the Minister for Health should liaise with the Ministry of Energy as well as the MOFEP to enable the provision of the dedicated power line to restore the power inadequacies.

3. Thirdly Rt. Hon. Speaker, the Minister of Health should make a special case by revising its CAPEX budget and engage the MOFEP to secure funding to procure at least five operational vehicles for the hospital.

4. Finally, Rt. Hon. Speaker, the Minister for Health should also consider proposals to setup a critical care nursing training school attached to the UWRH.

To conclude Rt. Hon. Speaker, I wish to state that though the UWRH provides a great potential to deal with the access gaps in secondary healthcare provision in the Upper West Region, this potential has not been fully realised due to budding problems. In fact, the ability of the hospital to provide the required care is threatened with imminent collapse if the challenges enumerated above are not addressed. It is therefore my ardent hope that this statement will call into action the relevant authorities particularly the Minster for Health to deal decisively with these challenges.

Once again, thank you Mr. Speaker for the opportunity granted me to make this statement.

Story by: Eric Dindobuo //StraightNews