KATH Lab Scientists lay down tools

Members of the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital branch of the Ghana Association of Medical Laboratory Scientists (GAMLS) continued their sit down strike yesterday, despite an appeal by the Ghana Health Service to call off their protest and rather table their grievances.

The KATH GAMLS began a one week sit down strike last Wednesday to protest the appointment of two medical officers to the department.

They have given the authority of the hospital and the Ministry of Health a one-week ultimatum to withdraw the appointment of the two medical officers.

They said if after the expiration of the one week, the issue remained unresolved, they would meet again as a group to decide on the way forward.

The members believed the appointment of the two medical officers to the department was an intrusion into the profession of the medical laboratory technician fields which, according to them, was regulated by an act.

The local president of the association, Mr Ernest Badu Boateng, told the Daily Graphic that at an emergency meeting last Wednesday, the members resolved to lay down their tools for one week in protest against the imposition of the two medical officers on the members.

According to him, the members had given management enough time to rescind the decision but “nothing seems to be done. We have been jaw jawing since 2018”.

Patients stranded

The situation has left many patients stranded as they now have to seek that service at private laboratories, sometimes at a cost higher than they would have paid at the facility at KATH.

When the Daily Graphic visited the main laboratory at KATH, it observed that the lab scientists had reported to work alright but no work was going on.

Patients who had showed up requiring the service were turned away, a situation that threatened patients accessing health care.

Not licensed

Mr Boateng admitted that the two doctors at the centre of the protest, as a result of being posted to the department, underwent training at the College of Physicians and Surgeons to specialise, “they have not been licensed by the Allied of Health Professions Council to practise as medical lab scientists and as such have no business being at the laboratory services directorate”.

He stressed that though all of them studied subjects related to medicine during their training, that did not qualify the lab scientists to become clinicians and as such did not see why medical doctors would want to venture into
laboratory science, invade their professional space and take over their jobs.

According to him, gone are the days where lab technicians learnt on the job and did not go to school to be trained.

“Now before you can practise as a lab technician, you need to pass a licensure examination and be given a Personal Identification Number (PIN),” he said.

Effect

While deploring the effects of the strike on patients, Mr Boateng said the members were compelled to take that action as result of lack of cooperation from management.

Lab technicians play a critical role in the healthcare delivery as they help the medical doctors in diagnosing with precision, through tests, diseases afflicting patients.

Management

Management of KATH had earlier written to the association last Tuesday asking them to exercise patience while the facility and the Ministry of Health found a solution to the issue.

The Chief Executive Officer of the hospital, Dr Oheneba Owusu-Danso, said management pleaded with GAMLS to avoid any action or inaction that was likely to breach the industrial peace and hinder the care of the patients.

He indicated that management had also received a letter from the Komfo Anokye Doctors Association (KADA) complaining of harassment of two of their members attached to the Laboratory Service Directorate by the laboratory scientists.

He said management was fully committed to cooperate with all relevant stakeholders to find a lasting solution to “this issue which has dragged on for some time and in the health sector, especially in the tertiary hospitals,” he pleaded.

“When we got the latest letter from the hospital’s branch of the Ghana Association of Medical Scientists, we engaged them and told them that currently, there is a court decision on the matter, and even though there is no board in place yet, the hospital cannot decide on the request that they are making which is to reassign the two doctors,” he said.