B/A Regional Hospital in Ruins

The Brong-Ahafo Regional Hospital in Sunyani, the only major referral health facility in the region, is plagued with problems, including the use of obsolete machines and equipment, which is impeding the smooth administration of the facility.

The multi-million-dollar state-of-the-art health facility is gradually losing its adorable status, with many stakeholders admitting that the facility is in serious crisis. This compelled the Brong-Ahafo Regional Minister, Kwaku Asomah-Cheremeh, to visit the hospital to assess the situation.

It emerged, after taking the Minister round the facility, that the incinerator, which is used to burn clinical and other waste, has, for over some years now, been shut down due to the breakdown of its chimney.

The development has compelled the workers to burn waste in an open pit, resulting in smoke being released into the atmosphere, which raises another health concern to people living around.

The Waste Treatment Plant (WTP), which is supposed to treat liquid waste and pump it back to the facility to be used for laundry and other services, is also not working satisfactorily, due to a minor fault.

At the laundry department, only one out of the five washing machines was working. One out of the three dryers was also working. As a result of this, the hospital has to carry dirty clothes to the Goaso Government Hospital for washing.

The autoclave machine for the sterilisation of medical equipment takes two hours, instead of thirty minutes to sterilise medical equipment.

This, according to managers of the facility, is thwarting effective and rapid healthcare delivery, particularly, during an operation at the theatre.

But the Regional Minister indicated that all hope was not lost, and that the government had the intention to upgrade the facility to the status of a Teaching Hospital, which idea had already been mooted by the University of Energy and Natural Resources (UENR).

He said his working visit to the hospital was to acquaint himself with the challenges of the place, saying: "It is urgently prudent for some of the equipment which are obsolete to be replaced."

Mr. Asomah-Cheremeh disclosed that a group in France was prepared to assist the hospital, while Ghanaians based in Chicago-USA have also promised their readiness to assist.

He said the information gathered would also be passed to the Health Ministry, for them to act adequately on it.

The Hospital Administrator, Mr. Asare-Bediako, on his part, explained that before the introduction of the Health Insurance Scheme, the government was supporting the repairs and maintenance of some of the equipment, but the support had now stopped.

According to him, the money from the health insurance is for recurrent expenditure, and not to be used for capital investment, such as repairs and maintenance of laundry machines, dryers, autoclave machines and incinerators among others.

He said if the health insurance money was used for repairs and maintenance of such capital investment activities, then there would be regular shortages of drugs and other clinical consumables.

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