Wake-up call to Nigerian medical personnel

The poor state of Nigeria’s health care system came to the fore once again Sunday, April 24, 2016 following the auto crash along Abuja-Kaduna road that claimed the lives of six medical doctors and a driver from Ekiti State.

One of the survivors, Stephen Ayosanmi of Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital (EKSUTH), said his colleagues would not have died had basic medical care been administered on them after the accident.

Ayosanmi told journalists that when the severely injured colleagues of his were rushed to a nearby hospital, Doka General Hospital, about 70 km to Kaduna, they were told there were no doctors there.

“At the hospital, I was surprised when they said that there was no doctor there. I was even telling the nurses, ‘okay give me a pain reliever and let me put you through on how to resuscitate that man that was lying near me. But none of them attended to us. They were just running around, saying there was no this, no that. They were running around looking for this and that. Then I pleaded with the Road Safety Corps members to take us to the nearest hospital away from the one we were.

“I said they should take us to Suleja, Kaduna, wherever, but the Road Safety Corps members said that they didn’t even have fuel. I told them that it was okay, that I would pay for fuel. So, we left the place in search for fuel and bought the fuel on the road. But, before we got to the hospital (St. Gerard, Kaduna) the other person had died. That made the number of deaths six. The other very injured person, who was in the other bus also died, making the casualty seven”, he said.

We sincerely condole with the families of the dead medical doctors, the Ekiti State Government and the Nigerian Medical Association (NBA) over the tragic and sad development.

While we mourn the departed, we however, believe that the incident would go a long way in addressing the oft-reported inhuman treatment of medical personnel to patients in government-owned hospitals across the country.

The unfortunate situation the wounded doctors met at Doka General Hospital is not an isolated case; it has become the usual thing all over the country.

Today, government hospitals appear to have lost their usefulness. Patients on emergency to them die under the watch of medical teams as the doctors and nurses haggle over whose duty it is to receive the patients. In many cases, doctors who are paid to do their jobs are never on duty. They run about their private practices.

Many people die in the so-called government hospitals and teaching hospitals on account of negligence of medical personnel. A situation where fatally-wounded patients, writhing in pain, are left on stretchers for hours without being attended to is a common sight in government hospitals.

Instances are legion where patients rushed to teaching hospitals or general hospitals are left unattended to for several hours until it became too late to save their lives.

It is truly disheartening to see the sad state of affairs and we really wonder whatever happened to the Hippocratic Oath doctors take on induction into the College of Medicine.

While we wholly sympathise with those directly affected by the untimely death of the physicians, we must emphasise the need for a change of attitude on the part of care-givers in our hospitals. The experience of the doctors has justified the saying that it is never reasonable to throw a stone inside a market as it may hit one’s own mother. It could prove a boomerang as in this case!

We are also shocked that the senior doctors were allowed by their association to embark on a long journey from Ekiti to Sokoto by road. It is our belief that such an elitist group should value its members as not to expose them to unnecessary hazards on the road.

Had the doctors embarked on the journey by air, most probably, their lives would have been spared from this untimely and painful death.

We are sad to note that every institution in the state is declaring mourning periods for the departed. It is at best, medicine after death. This could have been mitigated had a deeper reasoning been put into the planning for the journey ab initio.

We hope that the ugly experience of the Ekiti doctors will awaken the consciousness of medical practitioners across the country to the sanctity of human life and also appeal to their conscience that they must review how they render their service to their fellow human beings.