Nigeria has some of the world’s worst health statistics but few specialist hands to help treat her millions of poor, sick people.
In March 2013, when the pains in Ogaga Akpojaro’s breast, ankles and wrist became unbearable, she rushed to a private hospital in Ozoro, Isoko North local government area of Delta state where she lived.
A doctor, whose name she recalled only as Dr. Ben, treated her with antibiotics and a painkiller, and explained that the pains were symptoms of fatigue.
That made sense since Mrs. Akpojaro spent all her days, except Sundays, on the farm and sold garri during evenings in the local market. So she took the drugs as directed, stayed away from work for weeks, but her condition worsened. By early May, her breast had become swollen and rigid. Her ankles became taut. She rapidly lost weight and could barely walk.
“When all the pain killers Dr. Ben prescribed refused to work, he said we should take her to Ughelli General Hospital,” her only daughter, Ifoghale, recalled recently.
At the new hospital where they travelled to same night, no doctor attended to her, so they returned to Dr. Ben who referred them to Federal Medical Centre, Warri. There, a doctor explained that she needed to see an Oncologist – a cancer specialist. Delta state, one of Nigeria’s richest states, had none. So she got another referral to the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH, Idi-Araba, Lagos.
It was at LUTH, where they had borrowed money to travel to, that the family got a startling response. Without examining the gravely sick woman, a doctor minuted on the referral letter and asked her to return in two weeks.
“I was shocked and said it was not possible. I cried with no one able to console me and I created a scene,” Ifoghale, a 17-year-old student of the Delta State Polytechnic told PREMIUM TIMES.
“I had borrowed money to bring my mum to Lagos and returning in two weeks meant more expenses.”
While she waited, sobbing, the doctor emerged in the door way, and she accosted her, and pleaded that she help save her mother’s life. But the doctor calmly explained to her the hospital’s burden, and indeed Nigeria’s, one that portends great danger to public health if a response is not quick: there were just too many patients queuing for the same attention.
“He said ours was a new case and the queue is quite long and may not get to our turn even in the next two months as oncologists are so few compared with the number of cancer patients in the country. But to assist us, she phoned another oncologist in LASUTH and sent us to him,” she recalled.
With Nigeria taking the bottom lead on several global health indicators, nothing threatens to keep those woeful numbers unchanged as the dearth of qualified health personnel in key sectors of health care.
Despite the rising cases of cancer, there are only a little above 15 Oncologists in the country, experts told PREMIUM TIMES. Besides Delta state, 28 other states have no Oncologist. Only seven states in the entire country have specialist care for cancer. These include: Lagos – 7, Oyo – 7, Kaduna – 5, Edo – 1, Ondo – 1, Sokoto – 1, and Abuja – 3.
Patients like Mrs. Akpojaro travel long distances, through states, to get attention. Many don’t live to narrate their experiences. Those unable to travel for lack of money settle for non-specialists, while well-to-do families go abroad for treatment.
In Nigeria, the Lagos hospital, LUTH, is one of the most visited.
With no Paediatric Oncologist in Adamawa state and environs, Benjamin Enema, shuttles his son, Monday, who was diagnosed with leukaemia, between Adamawa and Lagos seeking the resources to keep the five-year-old alive.
“It was one of the most hectic moments of my life. Shuttling Lagos and Adamawa every now and then was not funny,” Mr. Enema said.
As the family struggled to keep up with the rigorous routine, his wife gave up her petty trading, relocated to Lagos to be with Monday while the father hunted for more cash. Their other three children lived with relatives while the ordeal lasted.
http://premiumtimesng.com/news/144701-investigation-gravely-ill-patients-die-queuing-to-see-nigerias-few-specialist-doctors.html

Very true... But Nigeria, are u cursed or what? Sometimes when i think of the present Nigerian situation amidst our abundance, i feel like crying

Na wao

ntoiiinnnn...e good for una. Nigerians think doctors are fools, the useless country treats its health personal without regard. now most of the medics have emigrated overseas, those who want to be physicians are discouraged from being one
NGA is cursed with a lot of bad people.