How Nigerians can have affordable open-heart surgeries —Duchess Hospital CEO

CHIEF Executive Officer of the Duchess International Hospital, Dr Adetokunbo Shitta-Bey, has said the political will and collaboration between private sector and public sector will help Nigerians to have affordable open heart surgeries locally.

Speaking at a press conference to commemorate the hospital’s second anniversary, Dr Shitta-Bey said the provision of subsidised, affordable ‘open-heart surgery’ to nine patients with a variety of life-threatening heart diseases during a week-long cardiac surgery mission by the hospital is a proof to this.

He stated that the hospital, working in collaboration with the Friends of Nigeria Save-A-Heart Foundation, United Kingdom, provided the complex heart surgery for these patients who would otherwise have not been able to afford the full cost of the procedure.

Shitta-Bey declared: “To make that happen, we have partnered with Save-A-Heart Foundation to bring Nigerians in the public sector that have been on the waiting list for life-saving heart surgery, into the private sector, so as to benefit from the world-class equipment at Duchess International Hospital.

“For the past few weeks, we were able to assist about 12 patients who were on the waiting list at a public hospital, and it could have taken up to six months to get to their turn. We successfully performed open-heart surgeries on them at a very affordable cost.

“By the end of today, we would have, in this hospital, performed 26 life-saving open-heart surgeries. This is one of the ways in which we are offering global best practices in medical services right here in Nigeria while at the same time reducing medical tourism and capital flight.”

The surgery, he said, had a combined team of 22 trained and experienced specialists, comprising cardiac perfusionists, theatre practitioners, intensive care nurses, cardiac anaesthetists and interventional cardiologists. They were joined by 11 highly-skilled professionals from the Duchess International Hospital and 11 members of the Save-A-Heart Foundation visiting team from the United Kingdom.

He said the hospital’s mission is to reverse medical tourism by working closely with institutions and professionals globally to attract the “brightest and best” talent to offer their expertise to Nigeria, while, at the same time, investing in training and development to build capacity locally for the benefit of patients at home.

Dr Shitta-Bey added that to ensure Nigerians can afford complex treatments like open heart surgery, “there must be collaboration between the private sector and the public sector. There must be the political will to make it work and, together, we can make it happen.”

The head of the UK medical mission, Dr Onyii Nzewi, said the Save-A-Heart Foundation collaborated with the hospital to provide affordable open-heart surgery to restore hope and bring smiles to numerous individuals and families that have lived with the effects of complex heart disease and cardiovascular conditions for a very long time.