By; BAYO AKAMO, Ibadan
The Medical Director, Ibadan Central Hospital (ICH), Old Ife Road, Ibadan, Dr. Desmond Oludele on Monday, attributed unavailability of basic health facilities as a major factor responsible for high rate of maternal deaths in Nigeria.
Dr. Oludele made this known while speaking at the second phase of the maternal health gathering, organised for 500 pregnant women by ICH management to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the hospital,
The ICH MD stressed that there is the need for the President-Elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, to scale up standards of basic health facilities for pregnant women in a bid to reduce maternal mortality rate in Nigeria, which stands at 576 per 100,000 live births, according to the 2022 reports released by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
He emphasized the importance of standard basic health care facilities as well as education of pregnant women as an integral measure to reduce the rate of maternal mortality not only in South West Nigeria but in the whole continent.
“ One of the major cause of maternal mortality in Ibadan is lack of access to basic health facilities and ICH is well equiped with facilities to help pregnant women and also to educate them because education is also very important as most of them are not aware of what to do before, during and after pregnancy”, he said.
Speaking on the plight of pregnant sickle cell mothers, the ICH MD said there is the need for early diagnosis of mother’s genotype and regular medical checkup at competent medical facilities to forestall instances of complications related to their condition.
“For sickle cell patients, our advice is that as much as possible, go to the hospital or any diagnosis center to do the tests and know your genotype and once this is confirmed, they can always go to health facilities to do check up if they have any illness so that they can be tested and treated as soon as possible because most times, sickle cell patients die from their health condition because of lack of access to basic health”
According to Dr Oludele, this was necessary because sickle cell patients are more prone to anaemia and infection which, when not promptly addressed, leads to further complications, saying, with the availability of basic health care systems, a number of sickle cell patients successfully go through pregnancy and child delivery without hitches.
Delivering a health talk, at the event, a General Practitioner, Dr Ajayi Segun; said delayed response to maternal complains due to the inaccessibility of competent medical facilities and personnel was a factor responsible to irreversible complications which could lead to maternal or child death.
Dr Segun urged pregnant mothers and their families to put in place, emergency mechanisms to arrest unexpected complains or issues especially in the 3rd semester in a bid to guard against maternal mortality.
The ICH General Manager, Olajumoke Caxton- Martins in her remarks tasked government to establish more primary health care centers and equip them, saying, at the national level, this is where care of the grassroot department is more important”.
The truth is that the elite, the educated ones know they have to go to the hospital but at the grassroot level, the rural people they are still patronizing traditional birth attendants and going to mission houses to have babies”
