The Medical Director of the National Orthopaedic Hospital Igbobi, Dr Mustapha Alimi, has said it was wrong for people to attribute the waiting time for patients  at the hospital to a shortage of manpower. Speaking on the sidelines of the 40th annual scientific conference of the hospital on Wednesday, Mustapha noted that there was no waiting time for patients brought in on an emergency.

 

He said, “No waiting time in an emergency, as patients come they get attended to. For patients who come to our clinic on appointment to see a specialist, we are making efforts to reduce their waiting time by trying to streamline our management method.

 

“But it is going to be challenging because this is a public hospital. For example, if you go to some clinics in the hospital – spine clinic, paediatric clinic – on an average clinic day we have like 200 patients, the patients will not be attended to at the same time. If it is a private hospital one can regulate the number of patients that come to the hospital, but this is a government hospital, we try and see as much as possible patients.”

 

Alimi urged Nigerians to embrace health insurance scheme, noting that out-of-pocket payment was no longer in vogue. He added that the conference was organised to educate practicing orthopaedic surgeons, members of the public about current orthopaedic issues and what could be done to mitigate them.

 

“What we do every year is pick a theme that is trending. There was a time when we picked a theme on traditional bone setters. We also discussed their benefits, risks, and challenges. There was a year we picked spinal cord injury as a theme. We have also picked fractures in children as a theme before,” Alimi said.