Posted by By Tony Edike on
TO undergo a heart surgery at the Special Cardiothoracic Centre of the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH) Enugu, each patient will now pay between N800,000 to N900,000 under the reviewed fees approved by the management.
ENUGU - TO undergo a heart surgery at the Special Cardiothoracic Centre of the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH) Enugu, each patient will now pay between N800,000 to N900,000 under the reviewed fees approved by the management.
At present, no fewer than 50 heart cases are recorded weekly by the centre but 95 percent of the patients can not afford the cost of the surgery because of its expensive nature.
Head of the Centre and Consultant Cardiothoracic Surgeon, Professor Martins Aghaji, who disclosed this while briefing reporters on the three successful heart surgeries carried out at the centre last week, said unless the federal and state governments as well as corporate bodies come to the aid of the patients by sponsoring their operations, they would find it difficult to bear the burden.
According to him, even though the fee charged by the hospital appears to be high, it was still the lowest compared with other countries where similar heart surgeries were performed, stressing that the centre was capable of handling any heart defect as necessary facilities had been provided.
Aghaji said the feat recently achieved by the centre came about two years after the massive heart operations conducted under the sponsorship of the Kanu Nwankwo Heart Foundation, explaining that there was a lull in their activities following the exit of the centre's Perfusionist for greener pastures abroad.
Said he: 'We have now started in full swing doing open heart surgery in this centre. Since the Kanu Nwankwo Foundation programme about two years ago, there has been a lull and we have put things in place to correct all the mistakes. Essentially, there was a problem with one of the key elements of open surgery and that is Perfusionist, the technician who circulates the blood while you stop the heart and operate on it. We had that problem because one of our trained Perfusionist left us three years ago for greener pastures.
'Fortunately, we had to go into liaison with other centres in West African sub-region. These include the Heart Centres in Ghana and Ivory Coast. But in this case, we have Perfusionists from Ivory Coast and they will be coming on regular basis when the need arises. So in this programme last week, we were able to carry out three major open heart surgeries. The first is on a girl, who is about 21 years old who had been bed-bound for eight years. She had a leaking mitral valve and in a six-hour operation, we were able to remove that valve and replant an artificial valve, which the girl will use for the rest of her life. The patient was put on mechanical ventilation for almost three days and she has recovered."
Continuing, Aghaji said the second case involved a 15-year-old boy from Niger State named Aliyu Usman, who had a complex cardiac problem, which was successfully corrected, while the third case involved a three months old baby boy, Justice Ahana, who a serious heart defect but was given no chance of survival until after the surgery.
Also speaking, Chief Medical Director of UNTH, Dr. Tony Mba, said the feat was made possible by the linkage programme between the hospital and the centre in Ivory Coast, stressing that the hospital, despite its high quality cardiologists, had been unable to perform heart surgeries on its own in the last two years owing to the absence of a Perfusionist.
He appealed to the Federal and State Governments to provide the centre with a special grant of N100 million to enable it handle effectively rampant cases of cardiac defects, just as he appealed to the private sector to sponsor surgical operations on the helpless patients.
However, the patients who spoke from their hospital beds yesterday, said they were fast recovering from the surgery and appealed for financial assistance to enable them pay their huge bills.