'Pay Attention to Your Health'

By Julius Yao Petetsi

A family health physician, Dr Ayango Annan, has called on Ghanaians to attach importance to their health by making regular check-ups a part and parcel of their daily lives.

According to Dr Annan, who specialises in women's health at the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH) in Accra, "some diseases do not necessarily portray any symptoms at the onset stage and the only way for us to know our full health status is to attend check-ups."

He made the call when he led a team of health professionals to undertake a health screening exercise organised by FBN Bank Ghana, a subsidiary of First Bank of Nigeria Ltd, in Accra last Saturday.

The exercise formed part of the bank's Corporate Responsibility Sustainability Week celebrations (CR&S Week), which was held at Santa Maria, a suburb of Accra.

The health screening, which was also organised in Suame in Kumasi, saw hundreds of residents receiving free screening and treatment for a wide range of ailments.

Dr Annan stated, "There is the need for us to always know our health status in order to be in a better position to deal with conditions that might prove fatal if unattended to."

An optometrist at Optical Express Eye Centre in Accra, Dr Ellen Konadu Antwi-Agyei, said, "Most people in the community suffer from a wide range of diseases, but they do not come out, so until you do such exercises, you are unable to fish them out."

According to her, "A lot of eye diseases, for instance, do not have symptoms and thus anyone suffering from any of these eye diseases might not feel anything until the conditions reached advanced stages that rectifying it becomes difficult."

Dr Antwi-Agyei commended FBN Bank for the exercise, and appealed to the bank to consider rolling out such exercises at least twice every year for maximum impact.

The Head of Commercial Banking at FBN Bank Ghana Limited, Mr William Neequaye, who spoke on the rationale behind the bank's CR&S eek, said the programme was to amplify the culture of 'Employee Giving and Volunteering Programme', with a focus on reinforcing the values of the bank's SPARK (Start Performing Acts of Random Kindness) initiative.

"As a bank, we can only thrive in a healthy society, and thus, we consider the health needs of our customers and the general public as an important aspect of socio-economic development and our business," Mr Neequaye said.

"This exercise is our way of helping our customers and the general public receive medical care to enable them to lead healthy lifestyles," he added.

In all, over 400 people were screened at the medical outreach and health screening, culminating in thousands of lives that were indirectly impacted as dependents of the patrons.

The FBN Bank CR&S Week was simultaneously marked in Ghana, Nigeria and in other countries where First Bank of Nigeria Limited has presence.

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