Dormaa East District Hospital records zero maternal death - Director

The Dormaa East District Hospital in the Bono Region has for a period of 10 years recorded zero maternal mortality, Esther Akua Konadu Prempeh, the District Director of Health Services has said.

In a presentation on her behalf at the 2020 District’s annual performance review meeting on Tuesday at Wamfie, she said the Hospital did not record any case of maternal death from 2008 to 2018.

This she explained was because the staff were highly committed to duty and ensured only quality health care delivery services were provided on time to clients at the facility.

In a follow-up interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA), Ms Prempeh expressed concern that an incident each of maternal mortality occurred in 2019 and 2020 respectively and attributed that to poor road networks from communities such as Kofi Buo, Yaw Barimakrom and other areas with health centres, but with unmotorable roads to the District Hospital.

Ms Prempeh explained that the deplorable nature of the roads linking some of the communities was consequently causing late reporting of emergency delivery cases to the Hospital.

She therefore appealed to government through the District Assembly and the Wamfie Traditional Authority to rehabilitate the roads so that the District ambulance could bring emergency delivery cases to the Hospital on time.

Ms Prempeh commended the traditional leaders and Mr. Emmanuel Kofi Agyemang, the acting District Chief Executive (DCE) for their collaborative support to ensuring the effective operation of the Primary Health concept, which were vital in the District.

She said stakeholders, particularly the DCE and ‘Nananom’ (traditional leaders) were working assiduously to providing Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) Compounds in areas such as Kyenkyenase, Kofikrom and an ultra-modern Health Centre at Mewrenfiwuo communities in the District.

Touching on the Coronavirus disease (COVID-19), Ms Prempeh said the collaborative efforts of stakeholders and the health directorate in managing the situation was a laudable one, saying, the District had 68 confirmed cases, but no death or critically-ill client.

She, therefore, urged residents to continue to adhere to the COVID-19 safety protocols, particularly wearing of nose masks, regular handwashing with soap under running water, the use of alcohol-based hand sanitizer and keeping social distancing to prevent the spread of the virus.