How spinal cord injury shattered my career pursuit— Patient

To many that have come into contact with the 38-yr-old Adamu Abubakar, his courage and total submission to the will of God is the first attribute to notice; “Innalilahi wa innailaihiraji’un” was all he muttered as he recollects with great reluctance, the fate that confines him to a wheel-chair for over 17 years. Adamu Abubakar […]

To many that have come into contact with the 38-yr-old Adamu Abubakar, his courage and total submission to the will of God is the first attribute to notice; “Innalilahi wa innailaihiraji’un” was all he muttered as he recollects with great reluctance, the fate that confines him to a wheel-chair for over 17 years.

Adamu Abubakar Bichi was a talented electrician pursuing a university career in computer sciences at Bayero University Kano before the sudden fate that left him paralyzed befall him in 2002 thereby shattering his long held dream of becoming a computer scientist.

To him the memories of that day were more disturbing than his 17-year experience in absolute confinement with Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) because of the devastating effect it has on his career pursuit.

“It was on 15th August, 2002, the day dawned with tidings of ill will that shattered my dreams and ruined my life to a pitiable state” he said as he narrates his ordeals.

Abubakar who was a product of Government Technical College Ungogo was an experienced electrician rendering services within his immediate community in Bichi from where he gets stipends to take care of his aged parents and save some for his tuition fees.

It was in his routine hustling for school fees and other basic needs that he fell from an electric pole and got a crack in his backbone which eventually rendered him incapacitated for over 17 years.

He said since after the incident his life had changed remarkably as he now depends on others for everything including his sanitary needs.

“Today as I speak to you, I am on catheter because I can’t do anything on my own, my mother is late and my father has advanced in age such that he can’t take care of me any longer”.

In tears and with trembling voice, Adamu spoke about the opportunities he missed as a result of the injury even as he accepts the fate as a will of God.

“Being the first child of a family, goes with responsibilities, everyone looks up to you. Before this unfortunate incident befall me, I was very helpful to my parents that was before my mother died, my dream had been to become somebody that could rescue the family from the pangs of poverty but today this is what I become”.

Abubakar blamed poverty for his condition saying if his parents were rich and could afford the medical bills he would have been walking by now.

“When the incident occurred, I thought it was not this serious, though immediately, I became unconscious, it was in the state of coma I was taken to Murtala Mohammed Specialists Hospital in Kano where I was resuscitated before I was referred to the National Orthopedic Hospital Dala. At the Dala hospital I was diagnosed with a fracture in my backbone” he said.

He said after the diagnosis because his parents could not afford the hospital bills, they took him home and started visiting some clinics to get him some palliative care even as the situation deteriorated.

“When I was diagnosed with the spinal cord injury it was very devastating to my family even though we never know the intensity of the condition. In the beginning when doctors identified the problem, they told us that they were going to do some surgeries on me though they didn’t say the amount we were to pay and we were on that process, doing series of tests, the doctors embarked on an indefinite strike.

“The strike, coupled with the financial condition of my family, made me to lose hope and give up everything to God. My parents have tried and everybody in my family has paid the price in one way or the other to take care of me. My father who was just a messenger at the Bichi local government had sold off all his belongings just to get me drugs and other consumables, in fact it has been a very terrible experience on the part of my family,” he said.

Mid this year, Kano cluster group of Spinal Cord Injury Association of Nigeria (SCIAN) appealed to Kano state government to subsidise the cost of drugs and other consumables used by spinal cord injury patients with a view to alleviating their difficulties in accessing care.