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Regional news for Friday, March 5, 2021
Source: GNA
2021-03-05
Dr. Emmanuel Kofi Dzotsi, Regional Director, Ghana Health Service
Dr. Emmanuel Kofi Dzotsi, Upper East Regional Director of the Ghana Health Service, has said that doctors and other critical health personnel sent to the Region were refusing to take on the job.
He said that all efforts to convince them to report to work in the Region had proved futile, while there was a high attrition rate in other regions such as Greater Accra and Ashanti, deepening the staff shortage in the Region and paralyzing efforts to provide quality. health to the people.
Addressing stakeholders at the 2020 annual performance review in Bolgatanga, Dr. Dzotsi indicated that the Region was perceived as unattractive and therefore advocated for a high-level stakeholder approach to address the challenge. .
“As we all know, human resources are still the most important resource in all organizations, but in this region, the acute shortage of critical human resources such as doctors, medical specialists, medical assistants of all categories, midwives, laboratory scientists, pharmacists and many more is not good ”, he emphasized.
The Regional Director noted that since taking office in the latter part of 2020, three doctors had been posted to the Region, however, none had reported working.
“When I was assigned to the Region, they assigned me three doctors, but they all refused to come. They have noticed my number and if I call they do not answer. I have spoken with one, he is in Hohoe but the other two are nowhere to be found ”, he lamented.
Dr. Dzotsi revealed that the Region currently has 45 doctors and 505 midwives, which is regrettably inadequate to provide the necessary quality health services to the population.
He said, “the ratio of doctor per population in the Region is 1: 24,124, that is, a doctor who cares for more than 24,000 people and the population ratio of midwife to women of installation age is 1: 511, that is , a midwife who cares for 511 pregnant women.
There is also a lack of financial authorization to hire support staff and staff are not willing to be sent to hard-to-reach areas, especially nurses ”.
The regional doctor, therefore, called for a collective approach of all the main stakeholders to work to make the Region attractive, design incentive packages to attract and retain critical health personnel to the Region.
Dr. Abdul-Razak Dokurugu, Deputy Director in charge of Clinical Care, Upper East Regional Health Directorate, called for a review of some regulations that would oblige health professionals, especially doctors, to work in places where have been destined.
He advocated that health professionals who refuse to take over their properly assigned areas should not be paid by the Ghana Health Service and should be removed from the Service.
This, he said, would give the doctors no choice but to work where they had been assigned.
Dr. Samuel Kaba, Director, Institutional Care Division, Ghana Health Service, Accra, speaking on behalf of Dr. Patrick Kuma-Aboagye, Director General of the Ghana Health Service, noted that the doctors’ refusal working in certain areas had been a serious challenge.
It revealed that a proposal had been made to the Ministry of Finance for approval to ensure that incentive packages were available to healthcare professionals working in hard-to-reach areas, however, “hard-to-reach areas” would be defined.
