National Hospital or national headache?
We are the flagship of the medical institutions in Nigeria and endowed with sophistication in men and materials. Our corporate objective is to provide a friendly atmosphere for the care of all discerning patients without discrimination. We serve with empathy for the sick and devotion to duty. Our services are prompt, courteous, comprehensive, efficient and […]
We are the flagship of the medical institutions in Nigeria and endowed with sophistication in men and materials. Our corporate objective is to provide a friendly atmosphere for the care of all discerning patients without discrimination. We serve with empathy for the sick and devotion to duty. Our services are prompt, courteous, comprehensive, efficient and effective.” This is the mission statement of National Hospital, Abuja. But the question that readily comes to mind is whether these lofty ideals have been attained eleven years after the establishment of the hospital.
The National Hospital which was established by the government of Late General Sani Abacha and commissioned by General Abdulsalam Abubakar in 1999 was initially conceived as a specialised hospital for women and children. But three years after, it was converted into a conventional hospital with several departments, wards and clinics. To some analysts, that was the beginning of the problem.
The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Senator Bala Muhammed and Service Compact with all Nigerians (SERVICOM) seem to capture the problems facing the National Hospital in their recent pronouncement. Bala while receiving the board of the National Hospital a fortnight ago, told newsmen that the National Hospital has failed the country for not meeting up with the goals of its founding fathers. He said he was disappointed that such an edifice could not compete favourably with international standards. SERVICOM, in its recent report titled, “A nation of ailing Hospitals,” scored various government hospitals across the country, pegging the National Hospital an abysmal 45.5 percent in terms of service delivery.
Patients’ impatience
One of the most celebrated complaints against the National Hospital are documented in three articles written by veteran journalist and former special adviser to former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, Dr. Onukaba Adinoyi Ojo, when he lost his wife at the hospital sometime last year. Then, he decried the attitude of staff in response to emergency cases and handling of patients. On measures taken to unravel the circumstances surrounding her death, the Chairman of the Governing Board, Pharmacist Hamza Sakwa said a panel of inquiry was constituted to investigate what happened and they have since submitted their report. Weekly Trust could not access the report.
Then Haruna Ibrahim, a patient, said to him probably the biggest problem would be that of poor record-keeping. “My doctor recommended that I should go for an Oral Glucose Tolerance Test (OGTT) last year to determine the next line of action regarding my health. I went to the lab, where I met a pregnant woman who also came for the same test. The lab guy said I need to buy water to prepare the oral glucose solution as the taps were not running that day. I went down and brought bottle water.”
“As the test was progressing, I engaged the woman in conversation. She said she is conducting the test for the second time as the first result could not be found. When I eventually took the result to see a doctor at the General Outpatient Department (GOPD), it was discovered that my entire file was missing. This is after I waited for several hours. They had to open what they call temporary file for me. What actually annoyed me while the waiting lasted was that a woman came in and she made calls and in less than 30 minutes, she saw the doctor.”
Aisha Ismail-Abdullahi, too, had the same experience early this year. “I delivered in the National Hospital in 2008. I had a miscarriage in May, 2010 and I had to be evacuated. When I got to the hospital my medical file was missing. We wasted over four hours looking for the file. At the end, they opened a temporary file for me.”
Aliyu Bello has not recovered from the death of his friend in the National Hospital which he alleges was due to mismanagement. “We lost Abdulrasheed Yahaya in May this year in circumstances we are yet to come to term with. We brought him to the hospital and he was admitted. But it took them close to a week before they could diagnose that he had leukaemia and when that was eventually done, they had to hire machines from Lagos to do further tests. While all this was going on, we did not really see any improvement. Unfortunately for us he died the very day his visa was ready for us to fly him to India. Why should it take the National Hospital that long to determine an illness?”
One Rakiya (not real name) said: “My blood pressure was taken and it shot up, to the dismay of the consultant who now checked my file and noticed that I was given a wrong prescription. He immediately ordered that I should be given another drug before the test was finally conducted. This is supposed to be the National Hospital for God’s sake.”
No Panadol for this headache?
According to a pioneer doctor staff of the National Hospital who spoke to Weekly Trust on condition of anonymity, the pressure on the hospital is too much. “The beds were meant to be 250 but we had to make do with 200 because some of the wards were converted to offices and other things to accommodate other facilities. It was just a matter of time before the facilities would come crumbling under the weight of people that troop into the hospital.”
He continued that in the beginning, the National Hospital was the only hospital that had CT scanners and MRI machines, so patients were coming in from all over Nigeria and even other African countries. “Some doctors and nurses were getting frustrated as things were not improving and they were getting overworked. Ordinarily, the hospital is supposed to be a tertiary hospital but most cases that are supposed to be treated at the primary health care level are also brought here. Ideally, a consultant is supposed to see a maximum of 15 patients in a day. But here we see close to 40 patients a day.”
A senior nursing officer, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said since its establishment, most of the National Hospital’s equipment has not been changed. “Since 1999 when the hospital was established most of the equipments have not been changed as some are obsolete. Last year we had an outbreak of Lassa fever and we had no reagent to carry out our testing and we had to send the samples to Lagos and Ibadan. Equipment like CT, MRI and cancer scanners will work today and break down tomorrow.”
According to the source, the wards are not any better. “They are something else, as the beds have been there since 1999. Then in the private wing, the deposit there is N200,000. Where is the justification for this kind of money if patients are not getting the required services?”
Funny money
One major problem facing the Hospital has to do with finance. Director of Finance, Mr Leo Oniya said the hospital needs special government intervention. “We have made presentations to the federal government stating what we need to raise this hospital to the desired standard, So that we do not have many of our citizens travelling out to get medical attention. National hospital stands strategically to offer that service but of course not without the kind of special government intervention we are asking for. I recall that in 2008, we were asked to budget for N9 billon, which was required to raise the hospital to good standards. But it never saw the light of day.”
He said normally, the shelf-life of hospital equipments is about five years. “This hospital is ten years now and there has not been any major replacement of any of the equipment.”
Then the politics of it all, showing up. Dr. Lawal Tahir Musa, President, National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD), fingered inconsistency and favouritism by the boards and former Chief Medical Directors (CMDs) as culprits. “The hospital is just eleven years old and it has had about five different governing boards. This inconsistency has not helped the hospital. Some past CMDs didn’t help matters either. Today the entire hospital is divided along religious and ethnic lines.”
How’s management managing?
The Acting Chief Medical Director, Dr. Lamidi Audu also acknowledged, saying saying something is been done. “Most times, the patients that come in from other hospitals have little or no time left to live. So they are referred to us as the last port-of-call.” On late Racheal Onukaba, the Acting CMD said the hospital tried it best to save her life. “I personally reviewed the case file. If you take a look at her folder, take it to any hospital in the world and they would tell you that patient had the best hands working on her case here. Before they came in here the then CMD called every consultant to be on alert before her arrival. She was unconscious when they brought her. She has been critically ill for a long time. In fact, the referral instruction from the hospital she was brought from said to refer her to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of the National Hospital, which means they realized the severity of the illness. All over the world, the death rate of people that are treated in ICUs is very high.”
Dr. Audu also said in Abuja there is no hospital that can compete with the kind of services they offer at the National Hospital. “I can equally say that in the whole of Nigeria, we offer the best in terms of service delivery.” But another patient, who gave her name as Justina Achor, shook her head at that, scoffing: “Maybe they are the best at being the worst. They’re more like a national headache, really.” She then added that much as the management says it is trying to put things in order, it remains to be seen how those efforts will transform the hospital to its desired place of first hospital of choice in Nigeria.