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Clinical Hotel for the Rich
Posted by: Oluwole Akindutire on June 30, 2009 Under: Business & Technology, Life & Culture, News Snips, Nigeria, Wellness
Nigeria’s premier teaching hospital, University College Hospital (UCH) has introduced a ‘clinical hotel’ within the hospital to provide the kind of health care services people are traveling abroad for.
Unlike in general wards of the hospital where patients are provided with beds in big halls, patients in the Private Suites are allocated a room each. The room is fully furnished with separate toilet, bath and other conveniences, including fitted air-conditioner. The rooms also have television set with access to cable television stations. Internet facility and other comforts made available for the occupants. From the main entrance of the suite, the aura of a ‘hotel’ was evidence. It has its separate reception, a waiting room, and well kept corridor.
The uniqueness of the suite is not limited to the beauty of the edifice it occupies. It is the recipient of the services of the hospital’s best medical experts. The superb services do not come cheap. The suites are indeed exclusively for the affluent. Perhaps, this is why the management prefers to address the patients admitted in the Private Suites as ‘clients’.
The management says people still rush to pay for the service despite the cost. “For now, we have up to 50 percent patronage despite the restriction on advertisement placed on health care centres”. The Private Suites was also established to boost the internally generated revenue of the hospital, adding that both objectives have been achieved to a large extent. A power generating set is dedicated to the section to solve the problem of incessant power failure. Also it has a direct link with the water treatment plant for complete access to potable water.
One of the challenges of the suites, according to management is the problem of bureaucracy, being a government-owned institution, “due process” is observed in all things. It is hoped that the hospital enjoy a modicum of autonomy to bring about better efficiency. The suite is expected to soon have a purpose-built structure, designed especially for the purposes it serves, as well as special staff of its own. The structure being used was a converted abandoned building, while most of the staff are on contract.
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Misi Coker | Jul 1, 2009 | Reply
I think it will take a lot more than aesthetics for the Nigerian medical standard to be at par with the medical treatment received abroad. For starters, the private rooms and uninterrupted power supply is not a new factor in hospitals such as St. Nicholas Hospital and the likes in Nigeria, neither are expert physicians being flown in from all over the world to carry out procedures whenever needed a solution. The problem with the Nigerian medical sector is more deeply rooted than the cosmetics overhaul done by UCH. The fundamental problem with hospitals start from the universities. Most of our medical schools are ill-equipped, the technology is obsolete and the professors etc are still applying their 1960s knowledge and techniques to the dynamic medical world. All those factors plus bad salaries, create unmotivated doctors who after graduation opt for practice in other countries where they will be better compensated and educated. This translates to us loosing great brains by the dozen to the different hospitals/clinics all over the world. The solution would be to give these doctors better salary and an incentive to return home to practice what they have learned abroad, hospitals to plug into the medical technology world and upgrade their equipment as needed and also to provide continuous and updated training to all their medical personnel. Finally, most hospitals need to realize that not all of have them have the capacity or ability to provide in-patient care and thus would better serve the community if they restricted their practice to outpatient care.