Your Money Or Your Life: Should Nigerian Hospitals Insist On Payment Before Treating Patients In Emergencies?

 

Abuja, Nigeria. 2010.

Mr. Bello, a man in his fifties, was wheeled into the emergency room on account of a dissecting aortic aneurysm (in simple words, internal bleeding from the largest artery in the human body, the aorta). His condition was unstable and he needed an urgent surgery to do a repair of the bleeding aorta. He also would need the placement of a graft. This was a life-saving surgery. If delayed, he would most likely slowly bleed to death. Even if the surgery was done there was still a chance he could die but then he would have a pretty chance to live. It was no doubt an emergency. All was set for the surgery except for one fine important detail. Mr. Bello’s relatives needed to procure the graft to be used from the surgeon-to-be. The surgeon had taken the pain to get his own stock of these often life-saving grafts as they were not readily available in Nigeria.

The graft cost some hundreds of thousands naira and Bello’s family could not afford it. But since they had been counseled on his grave condition, they begged the surgeon to use the graft ‘on credit’ with the promise to pay later. The surgeon calmly told them it was either full payment for the graft beforehand or nothing. The relatives begged more and later came up with some money but it was still short of the set cost for the graft.

They begged some more. The surgeon was insistent. The patient kept bleeding and the relatives sourced for funds but kept coming short of the set goal. About two days of being in the emergency room, Bello was certified dead.

The Legend of the Toilet Infection; is that vaginal discharge really from the toilet?

Okay ladies, and those who care about them, it is high time we got this matter settled once and for all. A lot of my call-receiving time has been spent correcting this wrong notion. Often my fingers ached from time spent typing on various chatting platforms exploring this subject. At work, I am bound to attend to such. I am getting tired, these ‘toilet infections’ won’t just go away. 

So I now attempt to do this and hopefully succeed at it – I Intend to debunk the legend of the toilet infection. In the past, ladies have called me complaining of having toilet infection; often they can trace this to a particular toilet they used or shared in the recent past. But they are wrong. There’s nothing like ‘toilet infection’ – it does not exist in the sense it is used.

Nigerian Hospitals: Saving Lives or Merely keeping Alive Those Who Fail To Die?

I will not exaggerate. I will try not to be another lamenter on the bad state of things in Nigeria. Not that it is bad to lament after all it possesses the ability to bring forth redemption. Firstly, I will tell you a story, one I would have you believe is based on actual events.

Few years back, I was a medical house officer in one of the topmost tertiary hospitals in Nigeria. ‘Topmost’ here refers to one of the top two or three hospitals irrespective of the criteria used. It is arguably the most popular hospital in Nigeria among both health workers and the general populace. 

The Legend of the Toilet Infection; is that vaginal discharge really from the toilet?

Okay ladies, and those who care about them, it is high time we got this matter settled once and for all. A lot of my call-receiving time has been spent correcting this wrong notion. Often my fingers ached from time spent typing on various chatting platforms exploring this subject. At work, I am bound to attend to such. I am getting tired, these ‘toilet infections’ won’t just go away. 

So I now attempt to do this and hopefully succeed at it – I Intend to debunk the legend of the toilet infection. In the past, ladies have called me complaining of having toilet infection; often they can trace this to a particular toilet they used or shared in the recent past. But they are wrong. There’s nothing like ‘toilet infection’ – it does not exist in the sense it is used.

Are doctors really better than nurses? Will This War Ever End?

It remains one of the most baffling questions I have ever been asked. In an attempt to answer, I spoke with colleagues and friends. I called a nurse friend in Ghana with the main goal of discussing the same question, during my daily rounds, I stopped more often to chat with nurses, I tried to tap into a largely non-existent experience from dating nurses and I brought it up for discussion among my doctor colleagues. I realized the need to understand the many perspectives there are to this issue and finally I sat down to write albeit briefly on the ‘war’ between doctors and nurses.