Ho Teaching Hospital Annex inaugurated

A 20-bed Ho Teaching Hospital (HTH) annex has been commissioned at a location along the Ho-Kpetoe road.

The annex has an intensive care unit, a male ward, a female ward, a pharmacy, a theatre, decontamination and recovery units, a triage and an X-ray department.

“This clearly demonstrates the commitment of the hospital’s board and the management to an improved service delivery, quality patient care and the provision of accurate data in our research findings,” the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of HTH, Dr John Tampuori, said.

Commissioning the facility just before the recent general election, he said the number of clients at the HTH had increased from 350,000 in 2019 to more than 780,000 currently.

That, he said, was because as a teaching and referral facility, the clients did not only come from the Ho Municipality but also from other regions and neighbouring countries as well.

To reflect the current status of the hospital, Dr Tampuori said services, including endoscopy, neurology, asthma clinic, dietetics, pain management, CT scan, electrocardiogram, oncology and others, had been introduced at the HTH.

He said those facilities would help to offer exceptional patient care.

Further, they would help to provide comprehensive patient-centred healthcare, reduce the stress on staff and make HTH a ‘one-stop shop’ for the ever-increasing number of clients, the CEO of the hospital added.

Complete community

“With the large number of patients, staff, students and guests that throng the hospital every day, it will not be an understatement to describe HTH as a complete community on its own, Dr Tampuori stated.

He said currently, the hospital had a staff strength of almost 2,000 while an average of 4,000 outpatients visited the hospital each week and about 220 patients were on admission weekly as well, with hundreds of guests visiting the facility daily.

Dr Tampuori said as a result of the increase in the hospital’s population and patronage, the expansion, inclusion of additional facilities and operationalising them were essential.

Pursuant to that, he said the family health centre, a premier model realised from a collaboration between the Ho Rotary Club and the hospital, had been commissioned in addition to three other facilities at the main hospital.

Other units

The other newly commissioned units are two consulting rooms for the Psychological Medicine Department, a CT scan and the Pharmacy complex.

“As we inaugurate these facilities today, we are convinced that they will help to reduce the pressure on the existing facilities and offer improved services at the hospital,” Dr Tampuori said.

The Volta Region Minister, Dr Archibald Yao Letsa, commended the CEO and staff of HTH for the amazing feet chalked, saying the new facilities would definitely help to contribute greatly to the realisation of Sustainable Development Goal 3, which focused on ensuring that everyone had access to good health.

He appealed to the staff of HTH to establish a healthy maintenance culture on the newly commissioned facilities to prolong their lifespan.