Doctors and medical staff at the Binde Health Center in the Bunkpurugu-Yunyoo District of the Northern Region are calling for emergency rehabilitation of the facility to fix some structural defects and obsolete equipment.
Authorities say the facility lacks some essential medical logistics something that is affecting healthcare delivery in the area.
Three anesthetic machines at the health Center have broken down while heamatocit machine in the laboratory as well as the only ambulance have all become obsolete. It also lacks a blood bank.
The Binde Health Center was originally constructed as a specialized hospital by a philanthropist in 1996 and handed over to the Catholic Christian community same year to server the Binde community and about 70 other communities in the district.
The 71-bed capacity facility had up to date medical equipment ranging from anesthetic machines for general anesthesia, a modern theater for surgeries, and heamatocit for hemoglobin estimation.
It was however closed down after 11 years in operation due to a land dispute which was resolved in court.
In 2013, it was handed over to the Ghana Health Services and reopened same year as a health center.
The facility is the main referral center serving the Bunkpurugu-Yunyoo District and records an average of 250 to 300 out patients with about 60 to 100 in-patients each day.
Ninety six per cent of its patients who seek medical services at the facility are beneficiaries of the National Health Insurance.
The Center also used to serve as a research center for anti-snake.
Medical Officer of the Center, Dr Cristoe Nubabaare told 3News they situation has forced medical staff to improvise to offer healthcare to patients daily, noting some patients sometimes have to sleep on the floor due to lack of beds.
Head of blood bank at the Center, Alfred Binaan, said they are using domestic refrigerator which can store only four pints of blood at a time, “though the theater demands five pints averagely for each surgery”.
“You need below room temperature for blood as anything high would freeze the blood and that’s why though the fridge has some other two compartment, we just can’t store blood there because that is close to the freezing compartment,” he explained.
To ensure constant availability of blood, relatives of a patients requiring surgery are made to donate one pint of blood to replace what is taken from the blood bank.
Authorities say both male and female patients are housed in one ward. Dr. Nubabaare said “Patients here do not have that luxury of separate wards because our staff strength isn’t enough for monitoring…the only ward in the building which has no challenges is the theater”.
By Zubaida Ismail|3news.com|Ghana