Scarcity of specialist doctors in Nigeria
With a huge and fast growing population, and the increasing cases of certain diseases and ailments, the shortage of required medical professionals remains the bane of Nigeria’s health sector.
Investigations reveal that there is a dearth of oncologists – specialists in cancer treatment, pediatricians, neurologists and psychiatrists in the country. It is worrisome that with the rising cases of cancer in Nigeria, there are just 25 consultant oncologists in a country of up to 169 million people. Thus, we have a situation where it is only in Lagos, Oyo, Kaduna, Edo, Sokoto and Abuja that Nigerians can access specialist care for cancer.
In the case of treatment of ailments related to the nervous system, the country also has poor specialist capacity. There are 50 neurologists and 40 neurosurgeons in the country. In addition, there are only 600 consultant pediatricians in the country to cater for over 70 million children in the country.
It is reported that Nigeria accounts for 10 percent of global maternal deaths. Causes of this include high patient-doctor ratio which stands at 1:33,000 against the global standard of 1:10,000, and the high level of poverty. More people now live below the poverty line compared to seven years ago.
This dearth of medical specialists is not unrelated to the ineffective and cumbersome process of handling health cases in the country. The situation is forcing Nigerians to embark on medical tourism to the Far East, Middle East and Europe. It is estimated that Nigerians spend over 120 billion naira annually on medical tourism. And an estimated 5,000 Nigerians travel to India monthly for treatment of varied ailments.
In 2012, 47 percent of Nigerians that travelled to India did so for medical reasons; according to figures released by the Indian High Commission – 18,000 visas were issued for those Nigerians who visited India for medical purposes. In total, these Nigerians spent 41.6 billion naira ($260 million) in scarce foreign exchange.
The shortage of these medical specialists locally also means that Nigerians will obviously spend more than necessary to have access to the scarce medical services of the few experts available.
Experts have identified that low standard of patient care, absence of world-class hospitals and diagnostic centres and the stunted growth of the healthcare system, poor pipeline for high skills, poor health value chain, and low health insurance coverage have consequently led to weak effective demand for healthcare services, resulting in poor economics of scale for hospital services in the country.
There are a few things that can be done to increase the pool of medical specialists in the country. One is to check the rising emigration of Nigerian doctors by creating an enabling environment and an incentivized system that encourages excellence and rewards hard work. Others involve equipping our public hospitals with required medical equipment and infrastructure required for proper diagnosis and medical care.
It is sad for us that up to 4,000 Nigerian doctors are practicing in the United Kingdom alone, not to mention those in other countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Nigerians lose a bulk of their specialist doctors to the Diaspora. And so far as the conditions of medical practice remains un-attractive and discouraging in the country so long will this colossal brain and manpower loss continue.
Government, at federal and state levels, should declare an emergency in the health sector and implement policies that will ensure sufficient and skilled medical expertise is generated and retained in the country. It is not a matter of cheap talk and lip service; it’s a matter of life and death, an issue that should be top on their agenda.