Korle-Bu’s ICU needs urgent attention

While taxpayers’ monies are being reported misused on daily basis, critical care is said to be in disarray.

The Reconstructive Plastic Surgery and Burns Centre is a 68-bed capacity unit commissioned in May 1997.

It is the only centre of its kind and status in the West Africa sub-region and it receives patients from Ghana and the sub-region.

However, Dr Opoku Ware Ampomah, the Director, National Reconstructive Plastic Surgery and Burns Centre (NRPSBC), Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, is lamenting that an estimated amount of $1.5 million was required for the equipping of the three-storey complex, which was started in 2006 and commissioned on June 29, 2010, but had since not been put to use, because it was completely furnished.

Government, via the Capital Investment Management Unit of the Ministry of Health, had put up the three-storey building for the centre, which was now 90% complete.

The National Medical Equipment Replacement Project, with Belstar Development LCC as the main contractor, the equipment for a six-bed ICU and a six-bed High Dependency Unit (HDU) had been procured.

Work on the ICU, HDU, Theatre and Procedure Room with medical gas is almost complete.

It is sad to know that out of the 18 victims of the June 3, 2015 flood and GOIL filling station explosion disaster at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle in Accra, one of them died as a result of the non-functional ICU of the centre. Hospital officials say the deceased would have survived if the ICU of the Burns Centre had been operational.

One critical element missing is the provision and installation of a lift, stating that “an assessment by CFAO estimated the cost of the lift plus installation at €119,305”.

He explained that a typical patient with burns of about 40% body surface area would require about GH¢25,000. However, currently, the National Health Insurance Scheme only pays about GH¢1,000 per patient during the acute stage of treatment.

Despite all these challenges, a forensic audit into the operations of the pharmacy department of the Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital from 2010 to 2014 revealed that GH¢946,574.29 was misappropriated through bad procurement processes and collusion by suppliers.

The ICU is a unit in the hospital where seriously ill patients are cared for by specially trained staff.

Patients are admitted to the ICU for a variety of reasons. Some patients need close monitoring immediately after a major surgical operation or serious head injury.

Others may have problems with their lungs and may require ventilator support with breathing.

Patients may have heart and blood vessel problems.

Others in the ICU may have an imbalance in the level of chemicals, salts, or minerals in their bloodstream that require close monitoring as these levels are corrected.

Also, patients may have a serious infection in their bodies and may require specialised ICU care.

Considering the importance of the ICU, government should act quickly to save more Ghanaians from needless deaths.