Expert tasks medical personnel on knowledge upgrade

Expert tasks medical personnel on knowledge upgrade
By Olasunkanmi Onifade
Knowledge
Abuja, March 13, 2018 (NAN) Mrs Opeoluwa Adegoke, a Principal Nurse, Public Health Department, Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC), has advised medical and health workers to upgrade their knowledge for improved services to patients.
She gave the task during the flag off and launching of the Olaoluwaseni Joshua Adegoke Foundation International (OJA FI) on Tuesday in Abuja.
Adegoke, who is a Co-founder of the initiative, said the foundation was launched to immortalise her son who died three years ago of Leukaemia, saying the son was not diagnosed early until he was taken to India for treatment.
She said medical tourism could be addressed if the medical personnel were trained and retrained on their field of knowledge.
“The medical personnel should learn to do their work well, though they may not be paid like their counterparts abroad but they should get the right attitude to work.
“Some of this medical personnel need to improve themselves, things are changing, they need to upgrade and know the latest in their profession,’’ she said.
The Secretary, Stanley Jegede Foundation, Miss Genevieve Umunnah, said the poor access to quality and often expensive healthcare services was disheartening and should be curbed.
The President of the foundation, Mr Kofo Adegoke, said the foundation seeks to promote human well being through strategic interventions in the area of healthcare services and agricultural entrepreneurial skills development in rural communities.
He said there were enormous challenges in the agricultural sector, stating that lack of access to land, fertiliser, finance, good seedlings and poor mechanism was discouraging many from agriculture.
“Every single farmer you see is a private sector person and only needs access to technology, training, finance, land, information, market and infrastructure, so we decided to boost and unlock all these at the targeted rural communities.
“While many gains have been made in reducing global poverty, nearly 50 per cent of the people in the world still live below the poverty level.
“For us as Africans and Nigerians to succeed in lifting millions of people out of poverty and create a model of shared prosperity, it must focus on transforming its rural economies and a way to do this is for us to propagate the gospel of agribiz,” he said.
Adegoke said the foundation was reaching out to the poor and needy, and empower them economically through training on agricultural entrepreneurial skills development.
“I do agricultural business and this enabled me to foot bills for my son while he was seriously sick though we lost him.
“We wouldn’t have been able to do that without being economically empowered,’’ he said.
The president of the foundation however admonished Nigerians to imbibe the spirit and culture of charity and humanitarian services to mitigate the impact vices impose on children.
He also charged medical practitioners on more commitment and passion to healthcare service delivery, noting that the sector will improve if the human resources especially at government hospitals desist from nonchalant attitudes to patients.
Mr Kola Adegoke, the Guest Speaker at the launch and Chief Executive Officer, Berra Computers, Abuja, called for an overhaul of the health sector to avoid medical tourism by citizens.
He noted the inadequate provisions of child health concerns by the government.
He therefore tasked all and sundry to heed the call of agricultural entrepreneurship, saying a lot of benefits abound in it yet many remain poor and unemployed. (NAN)
OEO/MST
Edited by Muhammad Suleiman Tola