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By Ijeoma UKAZU
Nigeria’s healthcare sector is currently suffering so many setbacks such as poor funding to build and maintain infrastructures, inadequately trained staff, expensive healthcare services, poor remuneration of medical personnel, and brain drain among others.
Experts have continued to advocate for improvement in the health sector which they believe should begin with healthcare budget appropriation and fund release from the national budget.
According to a performance report released by ONE Campaign, since 2001, Nigeria has consistently committed less than 7 percent of the total annual national annual budget to health, leaving a major gap in the financial resources required to drive the health system.
In fact, according to data from the World Bank, the current health expenditure in Nigeria is a paltry 3.89 percent of our total Gross Domestic Product, GDP. The consequence is reflected in the high maternal mortality and child morbidity ratio bewildering the country.
Worried by this trend, the Clinical Pharmacists Association of Nigeria, CPAN, at a workshop has pointed out that to revive the health sector, the role of clinical pharmacists cannot be ignored else the system would fail. He called on the government to employ enough clinical pharmacists if the country’s ailing health sector must be revived.
The National Chairman, Association, Dr. Joseph Madu noted that only pharmacists are best trained of all health care professionals in the knowledge of drugs.
Madu made this known during the first year international scientific conference of the association, with the theme, ‘Healthcare in the 21st Century: Prospects of Clinical Pharmacy Practice in Nigeria’.
Madu, who is a consultant clinical pharmacist, also called on the Federal Government to implement the consultant pharmacist cadre in all healthcare institutions, and recognize the practice of clinical pharmacy, Doctor of Pharmacy, and the indispensable roles clinical pharmacists play in preventing, detecting, categorizing, and resolving of potential or actual drug therapy problems.
He stressed the need for government to specifically engage specialist clinical pharmacists such as infectious disease pharmacists, paediatric pharmacists, cardiology pharmacists, and critical care pharmacists, all of whom are produced from the West African Postgraduate College of Pharmacy, WAPCP, or other schools abroad.
Madu, in his address, cited the National Drug Policy of 2021, which stipulates the enshrinement of clinical pharmacy practice in Nigeria’s healthcare institutions, the classification of all drugs in the country to capture the class of pharmacy-only medicines (Pharmacy Initiated Medicines), as well as the Pharmacy Council Act of 2022, which encourages pharmaceutical care and its other aspects such as collaborative care and therapeutic drug monitoring.
Also, the first professor of clinical pharmacy in Africa, Prof. Cletus Nzebunwa Aguwa, in his keynote address, emphasized that the pharmacist is usually the first point of call on health matters for many members of the community, as a majority of the sick in the society, the first report to the pharmacy for help for all types of ill health.
He stated that pharmacists in Nigeria, especially those in various communities and rural areas provide primary health care and should be properly recognized for offering such clinical services.
The immediate past president of the Nigerian Association of Pharmacists and Pharmaceutical Scientists in the Americas, NAPPSA, Dr. Anthony Ikeme, emphasized the need for other healthcare professionals to work closely with clinically trained pharmacists for a better quality of healthcare in Nigeria, as seen in other countries with good health indices and higher life expectancy.
The conference said to be the first of its kind in the entire West African sub-region, was held in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State capital. It started with a sensitization road walk against drug abuse and misuse of medicines by clinical pharmacists.
The international conference saw people from various parts of the globe participating both physically and online. Some hands-on training and updated practical first aid skills for pharmacists were done and the conference was rounded off with an Annual General Meeting, AGM, and a closing dinner.
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