Obsolete facilities, broken infrastructure, poor electricity supply and inadequate funding are making it difficult for Nigerian teaching hospitals to provide treatment to patients with complex ailments, Daily Trust investigations have shown.
The hospitals are also overwhelmed by a large number of patients, affecting their mandate of training current and future health professionals.
Patients, our reporters gathered, scramble to pay the huge medical bills, even as they have to stay for days to be able to consult a physician.
In most cases, laboratory and other medical facilities for treatment of cancer, kidney, brain, among others, are either obsolete or dilapidated. In hospitals where the equipment function, poor electricity prevents officials from utilizing them.
The hospitals, according to our investigations, are mostly overcrowded because patients with ailments that can be cured at primary and secondary healthcare facilities are also trooping to the teaching hospitals.
The patients also complain of poor hygiene in some of these medical centres of excellence, noting that patients can even be infected with additional ailments as they are meant to stay with uncleared gutters, uncollected refuse and uncovered septic tanks.
Patients sleep in plastic mats in Sokoto
Patients in Usmanu Danfodiyo University Teaching Hospital, Sokoto, which serves patients from Kebbi, Zamfara and Katsina, and neighbouring Niger Republic, sleep on plastic mats at the emergency unit of the hospital for days due to the inadequate bedding facilities.
Available records indicate that the hospital gets an influx of close to 1000 outpatients on a daily basis and 17,133 inpatients annually most of whom suffering from cases that ought to be treated by primary health care centres.
“Some of the sicknesses are not meant for a tertiary hospital like ours. They are cases that can be treated at primary health centres and general hospitals. We can only come in when they reach a critical stage,” the president of the Nigeria Medical Association, Sokoto state chapter, Dr. Sani Abubakar said.
A staff at the hospital who asked not to be named said the only MRI machine, which is very important for neurosurgery, had been grounded for over five years while some of their CT scan machines were not functioning.
Also, out of the seven dialysis machines in the hospital, only one is currently working.
Dr. Muhammad Makusidi who is the head of UDUTH’ dialysis centre, told Daily Trust that the remaining six machines had developed technical problems as a result of many factors that included heat, unstable light and hard water which was not well treated while some had outlived their lifespan.
Foul smell overwhelms hospital
At the University of Abuja Teaching Hospital (UATH) Gwagwalada, Abuja, manpower to cater to patients is insufficient, as bad odour overwhelms some sections of the hospital.
Our reporter who visited the hospital observed that one of the male medical wards of the ENT department has been filled with the stench of odour from the gutters behind the building.
It was also observed that some septic tanks within the facility were virtually on the verge of collapse as some were left open.
Mrs. Jumai Audu, who has a patient at the ward said she has to use a handkerchief to cover her nose, especially when walking into the ward due to the bad odours.
Daily Trust findings revealed that the hospital has also been facing manpower challenge especially in the area of laboratory scientists, pharmacy, physiotherapy and nurses.
Epileptic services in Maiduguri
Facilities and services at the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital (UMTH) is a mixed tale of successes and failures; functional and malfunctioning.
Many other facilities such as scanning and dialysis machines are not up to date. It was observed that there are only two functional dialysis machines in the entire hospital.
The hospital has only one CT scanning machine, which malfunctions sometimes, leading to the referral of patients to Federal Neuro-Psychiatric Hospital, Maiduguri.
Services are satisfactory in some clinics, but not in others, such as the Cardiology Clinic where the number of patients far outstrip the numbers of doctors.
Mortuary services are inadequate. Spaces at the facility are inadequate, especially in the event of a bomb blast killing many people when the number of corpses is much more than the number of fridges at the facility. In such situations, many corpses are deposited on the bare floor.
In the Orthopedic Clinic, there are only three consultants, in contrast to the rising need.
The Chief Medical Director of the hospital, Professor Ahmed Ahidjo, told Daily Trust on the phone that the hospital is not receiving enough funds.
No MRI, CT scan in Yola
Some of the patients interviewed by Daily Trust in Yola said the N15,000 charged per single dialysis session at the Federal Medical Centre, Yola, was too exorbitant for them, as some of them had to undergo two sessions in a week.
“It took one month for my sick father to get a bed space, so there is a need for government to build more spaces,” Sani Abadam said.
“Services like blood tests, scanning are relatively not difficult, sometimes it takes just 30 minutes because the hospital but there are always long queues at the consulting rooms, sometimes out-patients spend hours waiting to see a doctor,” he said.
Our correspondent reported that the FMC Yola does not have MRI, CT scan or a cancer screening machine.
However, the centre has functional x-ray and scanning machines as well as laboratory equipment. There are also two functional Dialysis machines.
When contacted, the FMC Information Officer, Adamu Muhammad Dodo said the centre is the only standard health facility in Adamawa State had been overstretched with patients from Taraba and Cameroon.
The spokesperson of Adamawa State chapter of the Nigeria Medical and Health Workers Union, Awwal Ibrahim, lamented said many patients couldn’t afford the medical charges.
Battle for bed spaces in Kano
At Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital, Kano, some care seekers who spoke to our correspondent identified difficulty in securing bed space as their major concern. They alleged preferential treatment in assigning beds to the patients.
Malam Musa Ibrahim, whose son was admitted in the hospital with burns, said for over two weeks after the two-year-old child had emergency treatment he could not secure a bed space until three days ago when a friend intervened.
When our reporter visited the hospital a couple of patients were seen with their beddings and nets under trees after they had failed to bed spaces in the medical wards.
A patient battling cancer, Iliyasu Adamu, said he had been sleeping under the tree for over a week because he was not allotted a space.
He said because of the distance and financial implications he decided to stay within the vicinity of the hospital until the appointed date.
The chief medical director couldn’t be reached for comment as he was said to have travelled out.
Faulty dialysis machines in Jos
At the Jos University Teaching Hospital (JUTH), our reporter observed that there were large crowds at the general reception and sample collection centre where they collect blood samples for further medical investigation.
Fatima Ibrahim said her doctor had given her certain investigation to go for including mammography.
She said on getting to the unit, she was told the mammography machine had been faulty for over a year.
“I was told to do the investigation at a private diagnostic centre in Jos but on getting there, I discovered their machine was equally faulty. They then referred me to another centre in Bukuru but I am yet to visit it,” she said.
A man whose wife was undergoing dialysis, Kinsley Ekundayo, said he spends almost N60,000 weekly, since last year.
He said his wife’s kidney problem has affected some other organs, adding that there are several tests they needed to do in Kano because the facilities are not available in JUTH.
Ekundayo recalled a recent situation where a machine retracted blood from his wife but could not return it. He said the government should subsidize the high cost of treatment at its hospitals.
A patient, Abdulwahab Hassan, who has a heart infection owing to complications from kidney problem has his wife, Hussaina Hassan, taking care of him at the hospital. She said they have been spending a lot of money for the treatment.
Chief medical directors speak
The Chief Medical Director of UDUTH, Dr Anas Sabir, listed some major problems confronting them to include obsolete equipment, while some are not operating optimally.
“Some of our equipment like CT Scan machine, the services of our cancer machine and dialysis machines are epileptic,” he stated.
“It is not all our Anaesthetic machines in the theatre that are working. We still have machines that are there since inception and when they got faulty, we repaired them.”
Putting the ratio of doctors to patients within the range of 1: 25, the CMD also disclosed that there are 426 doctors in the service of UDUTH, comprising house officers, consultants, senior registrars, registrars and medical officers.
Dr Anas said the 700 available bed space ought to be enough as a tertiary hospital but the influx of patients who ordinarily should seek medication at the primary and secondary health facilities is telling on the hospital.
Also, the Chief Medical Director of the University of Uyo Teaching Hospital, Dr Ememabasi Bassey said “Before I came on board, we were not connected to the national power grid, and even after the connection, the power supply has been quite bad. We depend on generators, and all our generators are old, aging or broken down. The high cost of diesel is also a challenge.”
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