UE/R: Row as Health Centre allegedly neglects woman in labour

Journalists and some constituents of Navrongo Central had a very tough row last night with some staff of the Kologo Health Centre over a reported history of habitual neglect of pregnant women at the facility.

A young woman in labour, looking deprived of attention, rested her head in pain on a motorbike parked by her relatives on the premises of the health centre as it drizzled in that part of the Upper East region and the two sides engaged in a heated exchange.

It all started minutes after the Paramount Chief of the Kologo Traditional Area, Naba Tandegri Nwarigu Kugre V, a fire officer known in private life as Clifford Asobayire, had complained at his palace to the Member of Parliament (MP) for Navrongo Central, Joseph Kofi Adda, about the ordeal of patients at that referral health facility.



“Our [health centre] which is a referral point for both Naaga Clinic and Biu is in a deplorable state. The walls are broken. The hospital facility is just down, understaffed. Even when somebody is sick and you attend there, you are not attended to because there [are] no drugs.

“My people are suffering. A pregnant woman was referred recently to Navrongo from here because the staff weren’t there to take care of this pregnant woman,” the chief had said.

The newsmen, who accompanied the MP to the palace during his tour of some flood-devastated areas, made a fact-checking stopover at the health centre and, as if to confirm the complaints the chief had made, found on the compound another pregnant woman in agony with nobody around her except her relatives.

No sooner had the journalists pulled out their cameras than two men, said to be nurses at the facility, came out from the quarters around to prevent any pictures or video footages from being taken.

“I don’t believe I can just run to Parliament House or any other place, start taking pictures without introducing myself. How can you just come in, start taking pictures, just asking questions?” One of the men fumed at the reporters who roared back for answers as unperturbed cameras clicked and flashed from different angles.

As the constituents repeatedly demanded the whereabouts of the midwife, the other nurse called out the name of a woman again and again. In response to the call, a woman holding an umbrella over her head, walked from the quarters into the noisy scene.

She did not say a word except “I’m not the only one” when the journalists and the constituents asked her, “Are you the midwife?”, as she made her way quietly to the maternity ward where one of the nurses had received the pregnant woman amid the 20-minute-long row.

Nurses reject neglect claims

The nurses around at the time of the controversy strongly refuted claims the facility had abandoned the pregnant woman to her own fate.

“Carry your problems go,” one of the nurses told a reporter who asked why the woman was left outside in the drizzling weather.

He contended, “What is happening? A midwife spoke with the pregnant woman. You understand? They just came. Are you a midwife (asking a journalist who interrupted him)? Please, are you a midwife? Asem oo!! (Problem oo!!) Ask her what the midwife told her. They just entered.”

Too distressed, the woman, said to have travelled to the facility about 5 kilometres from her home at Kulebingo, could not explain anything. But a relative, Jacob Nchor, spoke to the press.

“This is what happened. I was in the house. They brought her with a message that they (the health centre) said they should send her to the house, that if the pain is coming more, then they should bring her back.

"The woman is actually suffering. She couldn’t even lie down. They gave her a mat; she couldn’t even lie down. So, I brought her to find out from them (the health centre) what is happening. I just came and you people (journalists) also came,” explained Mr. Nchor.

Mr. Nchor told Starr News four hours later that the woman had been referred to the Navrongo War Memorial Hospital.

“Some of the nurses are good. They take care of you. But the medicines are not there. The last time I went there with this my girl (pointing at her daughter), they said there were no medicines.

“They gave me only paracetamol and wrote a list of medicines for me. I went to Bencyn Pharmacy which is located miles away in Navrongo to get some medicines for her,” recounted a shopkeeper in the community, Amina Mohammed.