Health Minister views on Refusal of doctors to accept postings to Northern Ghana (Sunday, March 11, 2012 )

Story: Benjamin Xornam Glover, Bolgatanga The Minister of Health, Mr. Alban S.K. Bagbin has proposed the withdrawal of certification from medical personnel refuse posting to rural and deprived areas of the country, especially northern Ghana. This he said will disqualify them from practicing anywhere. “I hold very strong and untested views, which I think should be put to the test with regards to the refusal of medical personnel to accept postings to deprive places like northern Ghana. We spend a lot of resources training each other and we respect professionals a lot. Although we have not been able to measure up to their expectation by commensurately compensating them for the services they render, that should not push them to abandon us”, the minister said. Mr. Bagbin was responding to a questions from journalists as part of his duty tour of the Upper East Region, as to what can be done to redress the human resource challenges facing the health service delivery in the region. Recently none of the 27 newly qualified Medical Doctors posted to the region have reported for duties. The issue of doctors refusing posting to the region has been an age old problem. The present doctor, patient ratio is 1:36,000, while that of and nurse population ratio is 1:2,050. This therefore put a lot of stress on the already stretched the health workforce. Not only are none natives health personnel refusing postings to the region, natives practitioners are also not prepared to accept postings due to what the health minister described as family pressures. “The pressures their family members put on them is completely unbearable. It is like sentencing yourself to death when you come back home to practice”, the health minister opined stressing some measures must put in place to address the problem. He said government is making all efforts to improve on infrastructure and making it congenial for people to work in adding that a number of district hospitals have also been earmarked for the construction of modern hospitals. He said inteh Upper East Region, the second phase of teh upgrading of the Regional Hopsital in Bolgatnag is ongoing while Kassena-Nankana West and Garu-Tempane Districts are due to get state of the art facilities. “We are aware of the pressure from the region to get a totally new modern regional hospital for the people of the region but we want to plead with the people to allow the government to complete the current upgrading of the current hospital”, he said. He also disclosed that the government has procured 161 ambulances for distribution to the regions and districts to facilitate emergency care services. He said government has also placed an order of huge consignment of equipment worth $ 267 million dollars which will be distributed to facilities all over the country to improve on evidence based diagnoses as opposed to the present system of symptomatic diagnoses of disease and ailment. The Upper East Regional Minister, Mr. Mark Woyongo said the reasons why doctors shy away from the three northern regions of the north are due to economic, social and career issues. Some intervention he proposed is the introduction of “hardship location” incentives to attract doctors to the Upper East Region. This may include special incentives for the doctors who accept postings, priority when they have the opportunity to go out for further training amongst others. He also said doctors who come into the region lack opportunities to earn extra income from private practice and therefore encourage practitioners to venture into private practice since the opportunity exists. Mr. Woyongo said as a long term step, the Regional Coordinating Council has directed all Municipal and District Assembly to sponsor five medical students each at the medical school who will be bonded to serve for specified periods after graduation. -End