Health emergencies: LUTH CMD seeks improved referral system

The Chief Medical Director (CMD), Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), Prof. Wasiu Adeyemo, has called for improvement in the medical referral system for better outcomes of emergency health conditions.

Wasiu, who made the call in an interview with our correspondent on Thursday in Lagos, decried lapses in the medical referral system among hospitals.

He said that many secondary and primary healthcare facilities, including private hospitals, did not follow the due process of medical referral system.

Wasiu said that this resulted in poor outcomes of health emergency responses.

According to him, some hospitals refer patients without making necessary contacts and communications with the tertiary health institutions to ascertain their readiness to handle the health emergency.

He said that there was a limit to what a tertiary hospital such as LUTH could take in consideration of its personnel and available facilities.

The CMD said there was need for hospitals to follow due process of medical referral system by contacting the tertiary health institutions particularly before referring patients to the hospital.

He said this was imperative to enable the hospital to prepare and be ready to receive the patient and prevent situations where the patient would be rejected due to lack of a bed space or facilities needed for his or her treatment.

“Unfortunately, a lot of hospitals dump patients on us without due verification, contact or communication to ascertain the hospital’s readiness to receive the patient.

“Sending a patient with just a referral letter is not enough.

“There is need to always call the hospital, informing it about the patient to be referred and probably get its approval on phone before sending the patient across.

“There is a limit to what we can do, considering the number of personnel and facilities on ground.

“For instance, if the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) is fully occupied and a referred patient needs its services, will the hospital tell a patient already on admission to vacate the bed/facilities for the referred patient to be admitted? Wasiu asked.

However, a general physician, Dr Gerald Chinasa, said that the nation’s health emergency response system should be restructured to handle more critical health emergencies and save more lives.

Chinasa said that there were avoidable deaths caused by systemic failures.

He urged tertiary health institutions to prioritise saving lives, saying that lack of due communication before referring a patient should not be a reason for rejection of referrals.

Chinasa, who admitted that it was necessary for hospitals to contact the tertiary health institutions before referring patients, advised that tertiary health facilities should ensure that the contact lines and platforms would be available.

He said that most of the contact numbers found on such institutions’ websites and social media handles were usually not connecting, while connected ones, most times, would not be answered by anyone.

According to him, systemic weaknesses are undermining Nigeria’s emergency care system, including low public awareness and lack of trust in emergency lines, fragmented governance and poor inter-agency coordination.