Speed up dental housemanship posting -GMA

The National Executive Council (NEC) of the Ghana Medical Association (GMA) has expressed concern about the “current unacceptable mismanagement” of dental housemanship posting and training in the country.

It said some second year dental house officers continue to stay at home jobless while the country has a poor doctor-patient ratio of 1: 10,000.

Dr Emmanuel Adom Winful, President of the GMA, was speaking at the end of the association’s 4th NEC meeting held at Dodowa in the Dangme West District of the Greater Accra Region on Sunday.

“This sorry situation has arisen mainly because most hospitals in the country have no dental facilities and some of those with these facilities are not accredited to train dental house officers,” he said.

Dr Winful explained that generally, most of the house officers have become disillusioned and frustrated, saying that this was because some have not been posted as was the case for dental officers.

“In several instances, house officers do not have accommodation available where they have been posted including postings to some of our teaching hospitals,” he added.

He called on the Ministry of Health to speedily deal with these human resource management issues of posting and accommodation for house officers in a manner that recognizes the need to make the best use of the scare health professionals in order to forestall any industrial disharmony in the country.

In addition, the Medical and Dental Council should ensure that it accredits more facilities to provide housemanship training across the entire country.

On the emergency preparedness of the country, the association called on government to establish a Natural Disaster Fund and also adequately resource the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) and other agencies to deal adequately with these disaster when it happen and better support victims.

He said the response to the recent devastating floods situations in the Eastern Region attested to the poor preparedness of the nation in times of emergencies.

He appealed to all leaders across the African Continent to as much as possible use dialogue to resolve issues and not resort to the barrel of the gun, since this only result in untold suffering for vulnerable groups like children and women.