Persons with kidney disease can now heave a sigh of relief as the Renal Unit of the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital has been reopened to in-patients and will soon be open to outpatients.
The two-week closure of the dialysis center proved fatal owing to the alleged death of three persons. The struggles of many other persons with the disease in their quest to seek treatment elsewhere cannot go without mention.
Abigail Mintah was only one out of the many who couldn’t afford her weekly dialysis sessions after the closure.
“It hasn’t been easy. Money for dialysis is a big problem for me and my family. Instead of the two dialysis, I can only afford one, and Korle Bu is 491 and the private sector is 660 which I can’t afford two sessions, so I go once a week,” she said.
And the result of her inability to dialyse has not been easy.
“If you know me, you will know I’m not like this, my face is swollen, my eyes are swollen and my stomach. I went on Monday, and I was supposed to go yesterday, but because of money I’ll go next week”
But her woes and that of many others may finally come to an end. At least for now.
According to the PRO Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, Mustapha Salifu the Renal Unit is now open to in-patients.
“The closure was engendered by the shortage of the consumables, but we got some limited consumables. So yesterday, we actually started; we reopened to in-patients and as at 2:00pm yesterday about 5 of them were dialysed. The container is being processed and will arrive at the hospital today, and as at tomorrow we will start scheduling the outpatients to come for their dialysis,” he assured.
He also confirmed that the hospital is in the process of receiving 30 dialysis machines provided by the Ministry of health. A venture aimed at reducing the stress on the renal center.
“If a patient goes into the machine, they spend not less than 4 hours for a section to complete. If you have about 10 machines and you have 50 patients that’s a huge load on you and the hospital. So, if you get additional machines that’s a huge load off the hospital,” he said.
Mustapha further clarified what the hospital is doing, with regards to reimbursement.
“The hospital is looking for the opportunity to engage them on how they want us to treat the payments that were made. Do they want us to refund to them or they want us to credit them?” he noted.
For now, outpatients are only left with the hope that the renal center will really open to receive them on August 14, as promised.
