350-Bed teaching hospital inaugurated at Okwenya

A 350-bed capacity private teaching hospital has been inaugurated at Okwenya, near Akuse in the Yilo Krobo municipality in the Eastern Region.

The Kings and Queens Teaching Hospital, fitted with modern facilities, is the outcome of a partnership between a Ghanaian, Dr Jerryson Ameworgbe Gidisu, and the Chen Lihua Family from China.

The first phase of the facility, which cost $13.5 million, is part of a larger $30-million project.

Aside from serving as a centre for training competent health professionals, including ultrasound specialists, public health personnel and medical doctors, the hospital will also offer voluntary medical screening exercises in surrounding communities and other parts of the country.

Among the services the facility will offer the public are fertility, gynaecology and obstetrics, general outpatients consultation, in-patients care and Chinese medical acupuncture.

Others are echocardiography, cardiac holter, electrocardiogram (ECG), kidney dialysis and pharmaceutical services.

The Eastern Regional Director of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), Dr Mrs Alberta Biritum-Nyarko, joined other guests to inaugurate the hospital.

Objectives

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the hospital, Dr Gidisu, said the hospital was anchored on the clear and firm objective of providing quality healthcare services through collaborations.

He said the management intended to make the facility, which has the Kings and Queens Medical University College attached to it, a premier medical and teaching hospital in Ghana and Africa.

He said the facility would provide a conducive environment for teaching, research and training of healthcare professionals and also pioneer the use of new medical and surgical technologies.

With the vision of becoming a globally recognised centre of excellence in the provision of high quality medical health, the CEO said, the Kings and Queens Medical University College and Teaching Hospital had already provided employment for 150 people, mostly from the catchment area, and expressed the hope that the figure would soon increase to 250.

He further said the facility would be expanded to 3,000 beds, with satellite hospitals in the 16 regions of the country.

Significance

The Director of the Cardiothoracic Centre of the Hebei Medical University of China, Prof. Chen Lihua, whose family partnered Dr Gidisu to establish the hospital, said the relationship would pave the way for visiting Chinese health professionals to support in the provision of health care and the transfer of skills and knowledge to their Ghanaian counterparts.

“We will send in various professionals and medical experts from China to do advanced surgeries, exchange students and retrain more Ghanaian doctors in China to improve efficiency,” he stated.

Prof. Lihua later introduced an expert in gastro-intestinal infections and digestion from the China Hebei Children’s Hospital, Prof. Li Wenhui, who has more than 30 years’ clinical and teaching experience, to the people and said the expert would stay back in Ghana to support the training of doctors in that field at the hospital.

Commendation

Dr Mrs Biritum-Nyarko, lauded the management of the hospital for the initiative and expressed the hope that it would contribute immensely to quality healthcare delivery in the municipality and the country.

She advised the management of the facility to live up to the standard of the GHS by providing affordable, efficient and quality health care for its clients, as well as teaching, training and producing excellent health staff.

For his part, the Lower Manya Krobo Municipal Chief Executive (MCE), Mr Simon Kweku Tetteh, said the location of the facility on the Tema-Akosombo highway was very strategic and pledged the support of the two adjoining municipalities, Yilo Krobo and Lower Manya, to make the initiative sustainable, saying: “We are the first and foremost beneficiaries and we need to support management.”