Despite the expansion of Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) services in the Wa Municipality, the Wa Municipal Health Directorate says it is in short supply of Community Health Officers (CHOs) and Midwives.
The various CHPS compounds also lack delivery equipment such as delivery beds and beds for mothers after delivery. This is hampering the delivery of primary health care at the community level.
Speaking to GBC Radio Ghana on the sidelines of the 2019 Annual Municipal Health Review, the Acting Wa Municipal Director of Health Services, Beatrice Tengan appealed for support to expand CHPS services in the various communities.
The Wa Municipality has 42 demarcated CHPS zones in 32 Electoral Areas.
Out of the total figure, 28 are functional CHPS zones with CHPS compounds while the remaining have no CHPS compounds. Functional CHPs zones are defined as ones with compounds and trained health staff. Some of the facilities are also without Community Health Officers (CHOs) and Midwives to assist in skilled delivery at the community level.
Although during the 2019 year under review, the Wa Municipal Health Directorate with support from NGOs and the Wa Municipal Assembly expanded the physical structure of some of the CHPS services as well as the re-training and distribution of CHOs and midwives CHPS services in the region are still understaffed and underequipped.
“For 2019, we have not really added any new CHPS to what we have already demarcated. What we are doing is expanding the CHPS that currently exists in terms of functionality. Most of our CHPS do not have midwives but for 2019, we attached a lot of midwives to the CHPS compounds and then tried to provide them with delivery equipment to enable them give skilled delivery to the community members.”
“Some NGOs have also helped us to expand some CHPS compounds but for the challenges when it comes to the expansion, human resource is key. Looking at the number of CHPS that we have, we want to ensure that all of them have skilled midwives to conduct skilled delivery,” she said.
Madam Tengan continued: “if you send a midwife to a CHPS to conduct delivery, you need a delivery bed; you need another bed for the mother after delivery.”
The MCE for Wa Municipal, Issahaku Tahiru Moomen admitted that expanding health infrastructure will mean expanding access to primary health care. Mr Moomen said the Assembly is collaborating with some NGOs to expand not only the health infrastructure, but also sanitation infrastructure as that affects directly the quality of health care.
The MCE said the theme for the health review: “the generation and usage of reliable data”, is apt as it calls for critical attention to be paid to the collection and use of data to allow for effective planning and policy implementation.
“I am aware that over the years, the Municipal Health Management Team, the Departments of birth and deaths and statistical service have made some strive in collecting data during services during censuses, demographic and thematic surveys and other means.”
“We are lagging behind in the critical issue of birth and deaths registry, something which this review can highlight as it affects health policy formulation, resource allocation and service delivery,” he said.
Touching on the challenges facing the Wa Municipal Health Directorate, Mr Moomen assured the staff of the directorate that the Assembly with facilitate the construction of a befitting office space for the Directorate.
Story filed by Mark Smith.
