Gwagwalada Teaching Hospital Witnessing Over 650 Patients Influx Daily, Says CMD

•PENGASAN assist indigent patients

Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja

The University of Abuja Teaching Hospital in Gwagwalada said it is having a daily influx of over 650 patients coming to receive treatment at its facility.

Established in 1992 as a specialist hospital under the Federal Capital Development Authority, the Teaching Hospital said it now serves as both secondary and tertiary health institution covering the growing health needs of the residents of Capital Territory and other states bordering the city.

Acting Chief Medical Director of the Teaching Hospital, Prof. Bob Ukonu, spoke of the situation in hospital on Monday while receiving a team from the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) who were on a medical outreach programrme to assist indigent patients in the hospital.

Ukonu spoke of the challenges facing the hospital which includes shortage of hospital personnel to attend to growing number of patients trooping to the facility for medical care.

On the average, he said that Gwagwalada Teaching Hospital receives, “close to 500 Out-patients and over 150 others on admission daily.

“This number differs because there are those who are coming as an outpatient, averagely, on a daily basis, you see close to 500 outpatients and over 150 patients on admission daily.

“The hospital’s manpower has been stretched, and that is why you can see people crying out to government, please we need more recruitment. We need more waivers.

“You know, with the Japa syndrome, a whole lot has left.  Government has been doing a lot in terms of replacing them but more needed to be done,” he said.

Ukonu said there are so many indigent patients flooding the hospital by the reason of its location, being in the rural, semi rural or semi urban.

The Chairman of PENGASAN Foundation, Comrade Owen David said the Foundation was on a mission to empathize with the patients and to assist indigent ones with payment of their hospital bills.

He said that the Foundation has earlier made similar visits to the General Hospitals in Karshi, Bwari in the Federal Capital Territory, FCT and plans to also go the General Hospital in Nyanya in Abuja.

On the whole, David said the Foundation will be spending over N15 million in payment of hospital bills for poor patients in the affected hospitals.

“Mostly, we try to touch lives of those who cannot pay for their treatment so that, you know, the women, children, some of them don’t have, literally, the children. So, we try to get to those people that this thing can actually reach out to them. We equally visited the male ward to extend our assistance

David who was accompanied by the Secretary of the Foundation and Chairperson of PENGASAN Women Commission (PWAC), Engr. Ada Mbanaso and other members visited the Paediatrics Ward, Male orthopaedic ward, Gynaecology, Male orthopaedic ward and female surgical ward at the Gwagwalada Teaching Hospital to sympathize with indigent patients receiving treatment.

A total of 13 patients in critical condition benefited from the Foundation’s milk of kindness.