MTN Foundation Dialysis Centres Supported 738 Patients in 2 Years

MTN Foundation through its Medical Support Project contributed to ameliorating the plight of Nigerians diagnosed with kidney diseases as 738 patients benefitted from the haemodialysis facilities donated by the Foundation to 12 public health institutions across the country in the last two years.

At a stakeholders meeting designed to share success stories, critically assess the status of the MTNF Dialysis Centres and learn from various experiences of benefitting institutions since the inception of the project in April 2011, Ms. Nonny Ugboma, executive secretary, MTN Foundation, noted that the incidence of kidney failure has been on the rise in the country.

“These worrying statistics on renal failure coupled with the fact that we were inundated with several requests for financial assistance prompted us to act by supporting the health sector with 12 state-of-the-art haemodialysis centres for the management of kidney-related diseases across the 6 geopolitical zones in Nigeria,” she said.

The haemodialysis centres are located in General Hospital, Onitsha; Anambra State, Federal Medical Centre, Owerri, Imo State; Benue State University Teaching Hospital, Makurdi, Benue State; Federal Medical Centre, Yola, Adamawa State; and Federal Medical Centre, Nguru, Kebbi State.

Others are General Hospital, Alimosho, Lagos State; University of Ado-Ekiti Teaching Hospital, Ekiti State; Braithwaite Memorial Specialist Hospital, Port Harcourt in Rivers State; General Hospital, Calabar, Cross River State; General Hospital, Yauri, Kebbi State; State Specialist Hospital, Sokoto and National Hospital, Abuja.

The project, which has adopted the Public Private Partnership (PPP) model, has MTN Nigeria Foundation providing funding for the centres while the Federal and State ministries of Health, who own these selected public hospitals, provide the space, medical personnel, and a conducive environment to carry out the intervention.

“In the last two years, we have seen 2,266 dialysis sessions successfully done to care for 738 patients in just a little above two years of operations. This has resulted in many highly unstable patients becoming stable and living normal lives due to the quality of care they have received across the centres,” said Ugboma.

Commending MTNF for setting the stage and providing the platform on which stakeholders can deliberate and chart the way forward in the healthcare system, Dr. Bolaji Adebiyi, medical director, Alimosho General Hospital, Lagos, said, “in the course of planning and executing this project, medical personnel in many of the centres have acquired tremendous experience, thus improving the number of people with critical knowledge and skills to deal with renal failure in the long term. This is a beacon of hope in terms of building capacity in the health sector.”

Some Dignitaries present at the stakeholders meeting include, Medical Director, Alimosho General Hospital, Lagos, Dr. Bolaji Adebiyi, Chief Medical Director, Benue State University Teaching Hospital, Prof. Orkurga Malu, Medical Director, General Hospital, Onitsha, Dr. Angela Uwakwem, Medical Director, Specialist Hospital, Sokoto, Dr. Attahiru Isa-Sokoto, Representative of Nigerian Association of Nephrologists, Dr. Tolu Awobusuyi,  Representative of the Medical Director, National Hospital, Abuja,  Barrister Chris Mamman and other Chief Medical Directors, Nephrologists from other beneficiary hospitals as well as the project consultants.

The MTN Medical Support Project has also extended its scope to cover the area of Breast Cancer and this has seen the establishment of six mammography centres spread across the six geo-political zones of the country, specifically in Kogi, Yobe, Sokoto, Lagos, Enugu and Edo states.