Eastern Regional Hospital upgrades coronavirus Treatment Centre

The Eastern Regional Hospital has upgraded its 13-bed COVID-19 Treatment Centre to provide improved and critical support for patients on admission.

The centre, which has been piped to oxygen for prompt access and safety of patients and health staff, also has Close-Circuit TV cameras installed.

The CCTV cameras were fixed to support efficient care and monitoring of patients on admission as it would help reduce the number of times staff make a physical appearance to patients.

The GH₵35,000.00 facility was undertaken by Easy-Med Ghana Limited as its Corporate Social Responsibility to support Ghana’s COVID-19 prevention and treatment efforts.

Dr Arko Akoto-Ampaw, the Medical Director of the Hospital, said the upgrade was to make the treatment centre a high dependency unit.

He said oxygen was a critical component in the treatment of COVID but its delivery was difficult as far as safety standards were concerned.

He said the hospital had an oxygen plant but for quick response, oxygen was initially delivered to the unit in tanks, posing danger to both patients and staff due to lack of pipes.

He also explained that the CCTV camera would help to monitor patients on admission while entertainment facilities would give COVID-19 patients the needed comfort during recovery.

Currently, the Eastern Regional Hospital has 33 COVID-19 patients with a few at the hospital while the rest are being managed from home, according to hospital officials.

Between January and April this year, 310 positive cases of the virus were recorded out of 873 suspected cases.

Dr Akoto-Ampaw said the cases were going down because the facility was undertaking clinical testing using the PCR machine with results within four hours.

Mr Yaw Mensah, the Managing Partner of Easy Med Ghana Limited, said the company had piped several health facilities to provide oxygen to COVID units.

He said the hospital was very efficient and relevant in the national COVID-19 treatment efforts since cases from the national capital, Accra and other regions were sometimes referred to the facility.