Some health professionals on Wednesday urged healthcare providers to put in place processes and systems that would improve quality of healthcare delivery in the Nigeria.
They made the call at a conference organised by an NGO, the Society for Quality in Healthcare in Nigeria (SQHN) in Lagos entitled: “Business of Quality and Patient Safety”.
A medical practitioner, Dr Austin Okogun, said that there was need for hospitals to invest in enhancing quality by way of adopting any kind of quality programme.
Okogun, who is the Chief Executive Officer of Lily Hospitals, said that this would enhance patients’ satisfaction, providers’ profitability and reduce medical tourism.
He said that poor economic environment, high cost of healthcare and poor governance were challenges hindering effective healthcare delivery.
“People are poorer now and not many of them can afford healthcare; not many people can even afford to buy healthcare plans that will give them the best value.
“So, there is less paying in healthcare and in essence, less investment in healthcare.
“If people are not paying money for healthcare, it means that health professionals who are to receive the money are not receiving enough,“ Okogun said.
He said that in order to reverse medical tourism, healthcare providers needed to invest more in quality, irrespective of the challenges.
“Investing more in quality is a way of changing the numbers and re-establishing better confidence of our patients with our efforts.
“When you have quality system the outcomes are better; people will want to pay, thereby increasing our revenue and less people will travel, because we are doing well in our country,“ he said.
Also, a medical doctor, Dr Daniel Folukoya, urged healthcare providers to make information available for the patients through the social media.
Folukoya is the Founder, “1 Dokita”, a medical technology company.
He said: “Healthcare providers need an online presence, because the world is going digital; most people do their researches online before they use any service.
“We encourage healthcare providers to put more information out there, in spite of their civic duties as healthcare professionals to provide health education for people.
“The providers are not only educating people, they are also saving lives and driving up the quality standards of the health sector in Nigeria.“
In her remarks, the Executive Manager, SQHN, Dr Olawuni Olaborode, said that purpose of the conference was to find ways of ensuring that healthcare providers make money and deliver quality services.
“So, many times, especially for private healthcare facilities, they are in the business, because they want to save lives, but they also want to make profit.
“Statistics show that medical tourism is cost one billion dollars; it is something to tell us that citizens have lost faith in the nation’s healthcare service.
“We need to start bringing in quality to the consciousness of people in addition to trying to make profit; there are ways we can deliver quality at a lower cost and then make profits,“ Olaborode said.