Collaborating with private sector crucial to transform health care

The chairman of Nijap Fuji, Kazumichi Kato, has called on all hospitals struggling to meet the health needs of Nigerians to collaborate with the private sector in acquiring sophisticated medical equipment to transform the quality of care. Speaking during the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Nijap Fuji and University College Hospital (UCH) Ibadan […]

The chairman of Nijap Fuji, Kazumichi Kato, has called on all hospitals struggling to meet the health needs of Nigerians to collaborate with the private sector in acquiring sophisticated medical equipment to transform the quality of care.
Speaking during the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Nijap Fuji and University College Hospital (UCH) Ibadan recently, Kato noted that it was no longer news that government alone cannot fund the health sector and said that a deliberate effort by hospital is crucial if medical tourism was to be brought to its barest minimum.
He said inadequate equipment in hospitals to handle complicated cases forced many to travel to countries whose hospitals are believed to be better equipped.
“We have decided to collaborate with hospitals, private and public ones to bring in equipment, install and maintain them at no cost to the hospitals to help provide the needed care Nigerians desire,” Kato said.
Earlier, the consultant to the company, Dr. Emmanuel Balogun lamented poor maintenance of installed equipment.
“A lot of medical equipment are languishing in hospitals, because most hospitals do not have the expertise or engineers to fix the machines when they develop a fault, but luckily this Japanese company has promised to be on ground to maintain, train and solve the problems before the crop up,” he said.
The chief medical director of UCH, Prof Temitope Alonge has welcomed the partnership considering economic meltdown and dwindling funding for health.
The head of UCH who was represented by Mr. Olubusayo Aiyegbusi, head of the Public Private Partnership (PPP) unit in the hospital said UCH had greatly improved its service, made huge profit from its investment through this initiative.
She added that it was time saving, an easy way to procure equipment and helps hospital provide services that its teeming clients need.
The chairman monitoring committee in FCT, Dr. Abdullahi Mohammed said collaborating with companies will help ease the challenges of diagnosis which have cost most Nigerians their lives.
“Most hospitals in Nigeria are not well equipped and they can explore this partnership to transform health care, even those hospitals that do have some samples of equipment are over worked because of long queues,” he said.