| Health care in Nigeria - The way forward (Part 2) |
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| Tuesday, 23 December 2003 | |||||||||||||
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This is the second installment on my series on health care. It is indeed fortunate that the present Minister of Health was a top official of the World Health organization, he would thus be in a good position to understand the international politics of health care and agenda creation. It would be important as Ransome Kuti did before him to coordinate Nigeria's health policy goals and funding with that of the various international organizations such as World Health Organization, UNICEF and the like. Conferences on health care should also be held at least once in 2 years. They should be held somewhere in Nigeria and should involve all stake holders. It doe not make much sense to have a policy conference on Nigerian health in London, New York or Paris. The various stakeholders should include people on the ground such as representatives of Nurses, Physicians particularly the National Medical Association and National Association of resident doctors, Physical therapist, State Commissioners of health and their federal counterparts. Representatives of a few international organizations should also be there including Physicians of Nigerian descent such as ANPA (American Association of Nigerian physicians). Care must be taken not to organize a jamboree but a way to share ideas, assess what needs to be done and what can be done to achieve them. Another issue is the fact that we need to train Physicians and Nurses in the art of Communication and teaching so as to use less medical jargon yet deliver the message. To mind comes my teacher in Pathology in Florin in the 80's Prof Albert Andiron who indeed is a communicator par excellence. He actually also hosted a television show in Ilorin entitled your Health. Also Dr Ajibola Olaosebikan established a Health magazine that one many awards. However the vast majority who are not gifted with the gift a gab would have to learn via collaborative efforts between Nursing and Medical schools and Faculties of Education. We need to avail ourselves of modern teaching techniques to better teach students and patients. The History of Nigerian medicine is also important. We need to acknowledge some of our legendary forbears so as to encourage those coming behind. While it is important to know about Greek and Roman physicians it is more important to know about Nigerians whom we can relate to. A good place to start is by reading the books by Prof Adeloye retired Prof of Neurosurgery in UCH. The ones that immediately come to mind are the biography of E Latunde Odeku first African Professor of Neurosurgery and also Early Medical schools in Nigeria. Prof Adeloye and his books are National treasures yet someone like this wouldnot be honored in his Country. From him we learn about early attempts to start medical schools in Abeokuta by the missionaries in the late 19th Century. We also are informed about the little known fact that the famous St Andrew's College Oyo initially started as a Medical schools and produced a few physicians by way of sending them to Glasgow and Ireland. He also talks about Yaba and Kano medical schools. Other Nigerian pioneers in Medicine and Nursing include Sir Samuel Manuwa, Lady Oyinkan Abayomi, Chief Mrs Kofoworola Pratt, Dr Barau Dikko the first Doctor from Northern Nigeria, Major General Ahmadu Rimi the first Nigerian physician to attain the rank of Major General in the Army. Anezi Okoro the dermatologist who is best known for his book ''Eze goes to School''. Percy Nylander the gynecologist, Oritsejolomi Thomas the main founder of the University of Lagos medical school, Prof Oshuntokun the late grand Master of Neurology. Another issue is that of book writing. I personally do not believe in handout which are popular in our Universities because this encourages intellectual laziness and does not encourage original thinking.. The reason handouts became popular is that prior to the devaluation of the Naira in the 80's most books were imported from Europe and the United states. However once the Naira got devalued it cost much more to import also since we did not have much of an indigenous book industry and printing presses were also import dependent, sections of old books started being photocopied and made into handouts. In the medical professions a few people did not succumb to this and wrote their own books. Examples include Festus Nwako in Pediatric Surgery, Oduntan in Anaesthesia,Jaja in surgery who worked with Badoe and Archampong of Ghana, Adetuyibi in Clinical medicine. A new addition to these is Prof Adesuyi Ajayi Professor of cardiology in Texas who wrote a textbook in medicine. If such people are encouraged the future of medicine would indeed be bright. These lights must not be extinguished. On a personal note i indeed thank those who have written after the first article. More installments would be coming. To be continued....Dr Olumide Ogunremi is an attending physician in internal medicine in St Louis, MO and the host of The Village Doctor Forum
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Posted by Robot| 13.11.2005 14:26