By Ibrahim Muhammad Kano
The Kano State Commissioner for Health, Dr. Abubakar Labaran Yusuf has assured National Orthopedic Hospital, Dala, of state government readiness of continued working relationship.
This is contained in a press release signed by Ibrahim Abdullahi Information Officer Ministry of Health and made available to press.
Dr. Labaran dropped the hint while receiving the Chief Medical Director of the hospital and his team that paid him a courtesy visit in his office.
The Commissioner revealed that the Dala orthopedic hospital is one of the three highly specialized orthopedic hospitals in the country and the best in the whole northern region, emphasizing that a lot of residents had undergone trainings in the hospital to specialize on orthopedic surgery.
He acknowledged that the existence of Dala orthopedic hospital has greatly helped in training the state owned orthopedic surgeons, adding that its being has enormously assisted in reducing medical tourism in the country and lamented that many people do not know the scope of what could be obtained locally without going abroad.
He noted that areas of spines, bones, etc are highly specialized fields that could be handled locally and reduce the struggle of foreign exchange, further noting that our doctors could get more experiences locally because of constant and frequent practices, citing the wise saying that ‘the more one practices, the more experienced he becomes.’
Dr. Labaran assured them of government readiness to collaborate with the hospital on research and super specializations whenever the need arises, requesting them to furnish him with their brochure for perusal in order to know activities the hospital offers for proper action.
The Commissioner also assured them of inclusion into the ambulance medical emergency services, a national programme duly approved by Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf instructing the ministry to go into it in collaboration with the federal ministry of health.
He added that Dala orthopedic will be allowed to station two to three ambulances at some major axis coming to state for evacuating victims with serious orthopedic cases and get something out of the services they are going to render.
Earlier in his speech, the Chief Medical Director of the hospital, Dr. Isa Nuruddeen, recalled that Dala Orthopedic Hospital has been in existence since 1959, commissioned by the late Sir Ahmadu Bello (the Sardauna of Sokoto), adding that its mandates is to provide services in terms of clinical care, training of doctors and other health professionals as well as research.
He said over the years, the hospital has trained more than 120,000 professionals and more than 1,000 nurses in different orthopedic accidents and emergency management in their school of post-basic training.
The CMD revealed that, through their efforts, the hospital has been able to ensure that there were orthopedic surgeons in all the northern states in the country, emphasizing that in any state of the north there has been two to three orthopedic surgeons trained in Dala orthopedic hospital.
He thanked the Kano state government for its support to the hospital over the years, soliciting for continued collaboration on training, management of patients and ambulance services in order to be rescuing patients of road accident crashes on major roads coming to the state.
