Why Aso Rock Clinic reduced patients ― Permanent Secretary

Lack of adequate funds has necessitated the reduction of the number of patients accommodated by State House Clinic, State House Permanent Secretary, Tijjani Umar, has explained.

The facility had recently limited itself to the treatment of members of the families of President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo as against the previous practice of attending to all staff of the State House and their dependents.

Speaking during the opening of a two-day workshop on service improvement in the medical facility, Umar said the authorities are determined to eliminate those he described as “hangers-on” and extend services to only those who are officially entitled to access the health care facility.

He stated that things are no longer the same with the facility, which he said, must be refocused to provide optimal service to the beneficiaries.

Umar noted: “The Clinic used to be a yardstick for performance measurement in the medical enclave and pride of the highly trained and experienced personnel working there.

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“However, over the recent years, it was observed that services rendered at the clinic to the privileged few, suffered a noticeable decline to almost zero service delivery.

This resulted in a mockery of the facility and loss of confidence by its customers on its ability to render effective service. In an effort to upturn this ugly trend and revive its past glory, the State House

Management reversed the Medical Centre profile granted the facility, to its original status of Clinic, in order to limit the number of patients it handles and also maintain the original purpose it was created for.

“As you are all aware, in order to further improve service delivery in the Clinic, an outpatient survey was conducted in October 2019, by the SERVICOM National Office and the State House SERVICOM unit.

“A Report on that regard had since been forwarded to me and in order to review the findings of the survey, as well as propose an action plan indicating short, medium and long term actions to improve service delivery at the Clinic, I approved that this session be convened, involving all relevant stakeholders, and cut across all departments of the clinic, with the active involvement of the SERVICOM Unit, to promote service improvement in the Clinic.”

The Permanent Secretary expressed the hope that the workshop will ensure that appropriate proposals are presented geared towards the improvement of service delivery at the State House Clinic.

 

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