The Chief Medical Director of the IBB Specialist Hospital in Minna, Niger State, Dr. Bala Waziri has bemoaned the mass exodus of medical practitioners from across the country and the north, especially to foreign lands for greener pasture.
Waziri, while lamenting that no department in the health centres is spared, said the unabating flight of these specialists has seriously affected all levels of medical operations, including the primary secondary and tertiary health centres, which can not meet the demands of patients who daily flock to the hospitals.
In an exclusive interview with Arewa PUNCH, Waziri suggested a waiver on replacement as a way the deficit of medical personnel in hospitals can be addressed.
He opened up that the mass exodus of doctors from hospitals has equally seriously affected the IBB Specialist Hospital as well.
“The Japa syndrome like it is called in local parlance has seriously affected us. In fact, it has affected all the health institutions everywhere, and everybody is struggling to maintain their institutions.
“For instance, here, we have to also engage doctors on locum basis to cushion some of these gaps.
“The other thing is to also encourage the government. I think the Federal Government has also gotten to that level, because despite the fact that we talk about japa you still have quite a number of doctors out there looking for job, that’s the truth of the matter and they keep coming to you but they tell you that there is an embargo on employment.
“I know at the Federal level, they have gotten what they call waiver on replacement. When a practitioner leaves, you can actually replace because if you don’t do that, let me give you an example, one time an interview was called for 70 doctors in Niger State here and we could only lay our hands on 15 doctors to come for the CBT exams. And believe me, even after taking those 15 doctors, the attrition rate will be high.
“Just give them five or six months, many of them will tell you they are leaving. They will tender their resignation. So, we are encouraging the government to put in place a waiver on replacement. If a doctor leaves, you also have other people out there to replace them.
“The issue of teaching hospitals is also another very good initiative because teaching hospitals will want to make people stay back. As a medical person, as a medical doctor, after your first degree, you’ll want to specialise in certain areas. So, if that scheme is not available in your institution, of course, people will leave to where it is available even within the country,” Waziri explained.
Meanwhile, Arewa PUNCH investigations further reveal that presently, it is estimated that the ratio of doctor to patient in Nigeria is as high as one doctor to over 6000 patients while the World Health Organisation ratio is one doctor to 600 patients.
Dr Waziri, who is a Neprologist and Epidemiologist specialist, encouraged more residents in the north, especially to get vaccinated, saying it has done a great deal of good for Nigerians.
Elaborating, the medic stressed, “If I tell you the history of vaccine and how vaccine has assisted this nation, you’ll be amazed. For instance, in the case of polio, now you hardly hear about polio. Over the last few decades, we have seen cases of polio whereby somebody will come with paralysis. Sometimes, you see persons with some of these deformities you see – some adult deformities are largely due to that polio thing.
“Measles too could be devastating. We also talk about hepatitis B, which is another deadly infection, and it is also quite prevalent in this society. Of course, hepatitis B is not curable, but with vaccination, it has assisted a lot in preventing people from getting hepatitis B.
“If you look at the publication associated with it, you’ll know that if they ask you to take vaccine against hepatitis B, you might pay extra to get that vaccine.
“When you’re presented with the case, like what we call the chronic liver disease, it gets to a stage we just talked about liver transplant.
Sometimes, you just look at them because there’s nothing much you can do for them because it has gotten to the terminal stage.
“I can walk you into the ward and show you may be, two to three patients with the liver disease, and all we are doing is more like a kind of palliative to support them live.
“But with the vaccine, we can reduce the number of people coming down with the infection, even getting contacted. So, it’s a very good thing and we encourage people to take it. In fact, vaccinations have revolutionalised medicine and preventing medicine in the country,” he informed Arewa PUNCH.
Waziri equally clarified that orthodox medical practitioners have not condemned herbal medical practice but observed that there is still work to be done in that field of medicine for man’s benefit.
The Ahmadu Bello University graduate noted that herbal medicine could lead to more complications in patients when the dosage is not administered scientifically and with knowledge of the exact requirement.
“Herbal medicine, traditional or alternate medicine, you know these are different terms used for it. We don’t say they’re completely not effective. If you know the history of most of the orthodox tablets we use, most of them are from plant derivatives, and these are also herbs.
“But what we are saying is that sometimes they will give you an herbal medication and say it can cure almost everything. Dosaging is quite important. A drug as simple as paracetamol, they tell you to take so and so dose. You don’t just take it anyhow because if you take overdose, it can actually cause another detrimental effect to the person. But for herbal medicine, no dosage, they’ll just tell you to take as much as you can.
“Sometimes they try to quantify and say one cup, two cups but scientifically, we don’t know how effective these things are and we have seen quite a number of people presented with complications associated with herbal medicines use, such as acute kidney injuries, liver injuries and we managed quite a number. Sometimes, you may be lucky to get out of that condition but sometimes these patients may progress to a stage that is irreversible.and they have to be dependent on dialysis,” he said.
