Making The Healthcare System Work Better
Healthcare is one of the industries that is experiencing difficulties worldwide. People in developed nations live longer due to improvements in lifestyle and advancements in science, technology, and research. However, socioeconomic issues often result in a decline in life expectancy in developing nations. Both extremes financially strain governments, insurance companies, and societies. The United Kingdom recently raised the alarm over the rising cancer death rate. Ebola is reemerging in Uganda, measles infection is resurfacing in Kenya, and Nigeria faces many health issues. So healthcare system is critical to any nation.
What are some of the global challenges confronting the healthcare sector?
One of the challenges healthcare faces is workforce shortages. Worldwide, hospitals are short-staffed. Developed nations need help to get enough, while developing countries struggle to keep theirs.
Another challenge is treatment cost. Many patients can’t afford treatment. Where insurance is available, cost burden and profit maximization objectives overcome patient interest leaving the government to extensively subsidize healthcare in many countries, balancing demand, supply, and cost.
The UN suggests allocating 15% of the budget to health. How can a country that is in debt adequately support healthcare? What can we do to make the healthcare system better?
First, the Nigerian Government should focus on optimizing resources. We should determine how much money is needed to improve population health and ensure the efficiency and accountability of current funds. It’s not about budget allocation but about effectively and efficiently administering resources to equip hospitals better and improve staff welfare. As part of resource balancing, the government can designate some teaching hospitals as centers of excellence for specific medical specialties and ensure they are fully equipped to handle those cases at scale.
Second, according to the UN, over 18 million healthcare workers will be needed by 2030. With current medical training and education, it’s doubtful we’ll meet that number, especially in developing nations. To boost output, it is necessary to reassess and reconceptualize the medical education system to fit current exigencies. Encourage younger individuals to pursue medical studies and incentivize private universities to invest in medical sciences education to improve productivity.
Third, Universal health insurance is necessary for efficient healthcare administration. Government should design a mass enrollment method with participation from the private sector. The insurance business should be well-organized, well-financed, and regulated to ensure fast claims payments. There is a need for increased insurance awareness and mandated healthcare screenings, and the government should prioritize primary healthcare availability.
Despite efforts in many countries to improve and build equity into their healthcare system, there is still a concern about the cost of medication. An important objective should be to minimize the cost of medication and medical supplies globally, which requires a thorough examination of the business practices of the pharmaceutical industry and decentralized production for easy accessibility and optimized logistics.
Great!
One crucial point highlighted in this write-up is health insurance coverage.
Another area that should be looked into is the computerization of operations. This will improve turnaround time; inputting and retrieving patient details will be faster and provide a centralized database to access patients medical hostory.
We have the brains here in Nigeria, we just need our politicians to listen and implement the solutions provided by them.
Federal Government hospitals bill not affordable for common people , consultation fee should be reduced to avoid masses going to quack doctors for treatment.
Government to look into nurse- patients ratio for effectiveness and should be fair to all health workers.
Federal Government hospitals bill not affordable for common people , consultation fee should be reduced to avoid masses going to quack doctors for treatment.
Government to look into nurse- patients ratio for effectiveness and should be fair to all health workers.
Well done Eng. Adelodun.
Beautiful write-up I must say.
We need to continually sing the points here to government and hoping they will do the needful as soon as possible.
This is really awesome, Mr. Adeolu. I enjoyed every bit as I read.
1. Like you said, it’s not just about budget allocation. It’s about knowing the needs of these healthcare facilities, most especially the primary healthcare centers ( PHCs) because they are closer to the grassroots. If Government-owned PHCs are well equipped and staffed, patients won’t go to private clinics where they have quack doctors.
2. Insurance too is a really important point that Government has to create awareness for and be readily active in that aspect. I work in a hospital where some equipments that are under NHIS do not work. In this case, patients have no choice but to pay from their pockets for these treatments. Also, why can’t insurance also cover tertiary level treatment for indigent patients? These patients can’t afford these surgery bills and they die in the long run.
3. About that medical education. I think Nigeria is doing quite well in that aspect. Medical education is cheaper in Nigeria, compared to other nations but these brains move out of the country because salaries and incentives are not motivating enough. The hazard effect of this is that experienced Nurses and Doctors move out of the system, leaving the young and inexperienced ones to attend to patients (ahhh Danger 😂).
4. Another problem we face is medical tourism. Like you said about having designated hospitals for some medical treatments, if we have the required equipments in this country, people don’t have to take their money (which is supposed to come into our healthcare purse) out of the country for surgeries.
All of these problems ball down to Leadership. Let’s just hope we have leaders that are really informed and will be willing to turn our healthcare around, someday.
Thank you for this piece again, Mr. Adeolu.
Absolutely brilliant piece. I just want to lend a few cents to the discourse.
1. We need a more robust conversation on how to fix health care in Nigeria, just like we need same for every facet of our public life.
2. We need to agree that provision of public health is a global challenge now irrespective of the wealth of a nation… the rethorics “free healthcare” our forefathers used to win election in those days which shamefully our current politicians use today, which they can’t fulfill has to stop. No country in the world today can give this to all its citizens.
3. Given these points, we need to have intellectual discourse around what public health can go round, who should mandatorily benefit, how to roll it out, funding, resourcing, equipping the infrastructure etc
These conversation should be Frank and engaging. We should not be shy to have a blend of natural therapies with orthodox, we should consider primary health as a preventive measure against more expensive treatment if we allow escalation of illnesses. We should consider critical infrastructure that can help eliminate medical expenses. We should consider healthy life style, we should consider birth control and how this can improve quality of life. There is economics to illnesses and also wellbeing… can we strategically consider this…
Just some thoughts….. Am sure there will be part 2. 3 , 4 to this brilliant piece…. Shalom.
Absolutely brilliant piece. I just want to lend a few cents to the discourse.
1. We need a more robust conversation on how to fix health care in Nigeria, just like we need same for every facet of our public life.
2. We need to agree that provision of public health is a global challenge now irrespective of the wealth of a nation… the rethorics “free healthcare” our forefathers used to win election in those days which shamefully our current politicians use today, which they can’t fulfill has to stop. No country in the world today can give this to all its citizens.
3. Given these points, we need to have intellectual discourse around what public health can go round, who should mandatorily benefit, how to roll it out, funding, resourcing, equipping the infrastructure etc
These conversation should be Frank and engaging. We should not be shy to have a blend of natural therapies with orthodox, we should consider primary health as a preventive measure against more expensive treatment if we allow escalation of illnesses. We should consider critical infrastructure that can help eliminate medical expenses. We should consider healthy life style, we should consider birth control and how this can improve quality of life. There is economics to illnesses and also wellbeing… can we strategically consider this…
Just some thoughts….. Am sure there will be part 2. 3 , 4 to this brilliant piece…. Shalom.