The giant strides of National Eye Centre has continuously raise standard for effective medical practice within it catchment areas and beyond giving hope to Nigerians with sight challenges which no doubt place it within the core mandate of preventive, curative and rehabilitative eye care services. This feature recap the landmarks of the current management team of the hospital lead by Dr. Mahmoud Alhassan in his first tenure and the blueprint for the next 4years.
An over view of the past four years of stewardship witnessed remarkable additions in terms of patient attendance, sub-specialty manpower development, provision of comprehensive investigative and therapeutic ophthalmic equipment, upgrade of the medical laboratory complex, and complete renovation of the hospital building along with sewage treatment plant, renewable power supply, and water supply. These have led improved service delivery to Nigerians from all strata of life needing eye health care.
Hospital Attendance
Within the past 5years, the Hospital has attended to an average of 39,261 patients per year, mainly Nigerians from various walks of life. This is apart from its various community outreach programmes which takes eye care services to the door steps of indigent Nigerians in partnership with Non-Governmental organisations, Local Government Leadership and public spirited individuals. This is often at little or no cost to the patient.
Infrastructural Development
The Centre has witnessed rapid infrastructural development over the years from November 2015 to date. Amongst the capital Projects undertaken by the present Leadership are as listed below:
1. Completion of 50 Rooms patient relations transit Camp.
2. Rehabilitation of dilapidated walk ways, concrete pavements and roof.
3. Rehabilitation of abandoned centralized sewage treatment plant.
4. Building and Structural Rehabilitation work at Administrative Building i.e (Block A), including upgrading of plumbing and Sanitary fixtures and also the upgrading of the building façade.
5. Building and Structural Rehabilitation work at all specialized Clinics i.e (Block B) , including upgrading of plumbing and Sanitary fixtures, retrofitting of Electrical fitting.
6. Complete Rehabilitation of the Primary Care Clinics (PCC), patients wards (Block E and C) , including upgrade of all sanitary fixtures, plumbing fixtures, electrical fittings and building envelop maintenance.
7. Comprehensive Rehabilitation work at Block (F) which houses the main theatre (housing 6 nos independent theatre suites), and also the Community Ophthalmology, residency training and refraction Units.
8. Procurement of utility vehicles for hospital logistics i.e Toyota Hilux, Hyundai Elentra, Toyota Corolla.
9. During the period under review, water and electricity for clinical and other uses have improved significantly especially with the drilling of additional boreholes and increased investment in maintenance of facilities.
10. The Management has commenced a phased upgrade of the substations and power control equipments to ensure adequate and uninterrupted power supply to the hospital complex.
Sub-specialty Manpower Development
The hospital in the last four years provided state-of-the art facilities and conducive work environment to provide special ophthalmic services for patients in need of them. The paucity of such care in the past has led to exodus of Nigerians out of the country to access the services in developed countries of Europe, America and Asia (medical tourism). For instance, a number of patients had to commit huge amount of resources to travel out in order to have corneal transplant or vitreo-retinal surgeries which the hospital now offers. Therefore, its pertinent to note that our effort in human capital development has started yielding results though the complexity in accessing cornea tissue for transplant is still work in progress.
The knowledge of pivotal of human development as instrument for institutional transformation was the major driving force behind our investment in training of subspecialists in the hospital.
There is more than 100% improvement on sub-specialized manpower. The subspecialists were largely trained in various world – class institutions of India and Bangladesh. The training was also supported by CommonWealth Eye Health Consortium (CEHC); an intervention programme of Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Trust Fund. The overall idea and aspiration of the human capital development is to make our institution a training ground for subspecialists in the country and to also help curb the gale of medical tourism bedevilling our health and economic sector.
Electronic Medical Records (EMR)
This Management has also been able to start Electronic Medical Records (EMR) which is the practice globally.
Medical Equipment Procured Within the past four years
1. Equipping of sub-Specialty Clinics
2. Procurement of ALCON Posterior Vitrectomy Machine/Accessories
3. Purchase of a set of Optical Machine
4. Computer software acquisition
5. Procurement of various project vehicles
6. Computerization of critical areas in the Hospital
7. Construction and establishment of cornea bank
8. Supply of 2 nos Anaesthesia Machine
9. Construction and Equipping of Artificial Eye production lab
10. Supply of Anterior Segment/Cornea Assessment Equipment
11. Computer software Acquisition
12. Purchase of Medical Equipment – OCTA Machine and SL Bio- Microscope Monitors
13. Supply of IRIDEX Micro Pulse LASER Machine
14. 1 Unit EZ %%)) B-SCAN with UBM option Sonomed USA
15. Accessories for B-SCAN
16. 14 nos Ophthalmoscope Keeler UK
17. 1 no Binocular indirect ophthalmoscope (Wireless)
18. 2 no Lens+60D, 78D
19. 2 no Cataract sets
20. 1 no Diathermy machine
21. 1 unit Refractor Keratomater
22. 2 no B-Scan Machine probes EZ scan AB 5500 (USA)
23. 1 no Cautery Machine
24. Index Laser Diode photo coagular system Japan Firbre Optic cable
25. Anterior vitrectomy Machine (Germany)probes
26. 1 no. Ultra low Temperature Chest Freezer
27. 1 no. laboratory Refrigerator
28. Corneal Transplant set
29. Auto-keratometer
30. Iridek Micro Pulse Laser Machine
31. A & B Scan Machine
32. Scanoptic Microscope eye Piece
33. Sonomed “A’’ Probe Scan
34. Topcon A/T Table Plus Top
35. Topcon OCTA Machine
36. Slit Lamps Bio-microscope
37. Semi Automated Chemistry analyser
38. 10x Adjustable Eye Piece
39. 1 no Inverter 7.5 KVA Pure Sine Waves 200 Ah Batteries
40. Installation of inverter with 10 Batteries Racks, Cables and other Connector
Satellite Stations (Community Outreach)
In order to vigorously take eye care to doorsteps of rural dwellers especially women and children, the hospital sought the collaboration of Kaduna State Government to establish a satellite station in General hospital Turunku in Igabi Local Government Area of the state through an initiative called National Eye Centre Community Eye Care Programme (NECCEP) where the hospital provides technical and logistic support to allow patients to access cheap, yet qualitative eye care in their enclave. The programme has since been a success story and many people regained their sights through the initiative.
Other Community Outreaches carried out Within the period include:
· Medical outreach services in Kaduna Zone one Senatorial District (Makarifi & Giwa)
· Medical outreach services in Kaduna metropolis, zone two, Kaduna town
· Medical outreach services in Kafanchan and medical outreach services in Kagoro Town all in zone three
International Collaboration and Linkages
The hospital had attempted to collaborate with individuals and institutions outside the country for mutual benefit of the involved parties. Consequently, there had been in-house training of clinical staff by foreign mentors who volunteered to come to our institution. We had Vitreo retinal training by Dr Ihab Sa’ad Othman, an Egyptian Vitreo retinal Surgeon of international refute and another Vitreoretinal surgeon from Ethopia ,Dr Dereje Negussie Woyessa.
Blueprints
The Dr. Mahmood Alhassan led management will kick the ball rolling by reclaiming Government land taken up by land grabbers. The need for adequate number of highly skilled Ophthalmologists and Ophthalmic nurses need not be over emphasized. This, including the fact that the Hospital is the Apex training Institution for eye care in Nigeria makes the need for a post graduate Medical school imperative.
The School will expectedly continue to address the herculean task of continuously training Ophthalmologists known in everyday parlance as eye doctors to meet the demand of rising number of Nigerians who yearn for eye care services.
Increase Hospital attendance
The management will institute interventions and programmes to reduce patient waiting time, which is best indicator of promptness of service delivery. This will be achieved while maintaining good quality service delivery to all. We hope to grow the patient attendance by 30% annually in the next 4 years. Implementation of strategies to achieve universal coverage of health will definitely also lead to higher patient load at our facilities.
More community services
With the conclusion of the pilot rural outreach at Igabi LGA, we will seek further collaboration with the Kaduna state government to implement the programme in other LGAs in Kaduna. All other community-based service delivery activities will further be strengthened to offer high quality services.
Training and Retraining of Staff
The ongoing training programmes will be expanded while seeking collaboration with many other renowned training centers across the globe. All the core specialists areas including the paramedics will be properly trained. The National Eye Centre, Kaduna will become the hub for training of all cadres of eye health workers in the country and beyond.
More Machiner
With high ‘flux’ and ‘turnover rate’ of ophthalmic technology, there will be renewed zeal to update our ophthalmic equipment to meet of international standard. With good planning and proper advocacy, this is achievable
