Korle Bu upgrades 30 wards as part of centenary celebration

Korle Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH) in Accra will renovate over 30 wards of the hospital as part of its centenary celebration this year.

The exercise, estimated to cost about GH¢4 million, is expected to be completed within a year, especially if the hospital is able to mobilise the needed funding.

It will cost between GH¢600,000 and GH¢700,000 to renovate a ward, including the fixing of equipment in some of them.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the hospital, Dr Opoku Ware Ampomah, who disclosed this, said the project was aimed at improving patient experience at the hospital.

The renovation exercise would cover all departments of the hospital, including the maternity, child health, gynaecology, medical wards, psychiatry and ear, nose and throat (ENT).

“We want to revamp and modernise them. Some of the facilities are a 100 years old. The old blocks and some others were built in the 1960s, so definitely they need some renovation,” the CEO said.

Funding

In an exclusive interview with the Daily Graphic on the hospital’s centenary celebration, Dr Ampomah said the project would be funded from the hospital’s internally generated funds (IGF) and donations from corporate entities.

He said to raise the funds, the hospital had come up with an initiative dubbed “Adopt a Ward,” to enable corporate entities and individuals to support the hospital by adopting any of the wards for renovation.

The donors, including all individuals, Dr Ampomah added, could contact the public relations unit of the hospital or make their contributions through the short code *713*100#.

The renovation would consider the working environment around the wards, street lighting and rehabilitation of the pavements, he said, pointing out that they wanted to ensure that after the exercise, each of the wards would see a major facelift that would improve service.

The KBTH CEO added that although most Ghanaians acknowledged that the hospital had top-notch doctors to take care of their health needs, the hospital’s environment, state of the wards, the washrooms and the service processes were among the major concerns of people who used the services of the hospital, a situation that discouraged them from seeking their services.

Dr Ampomah, therefore, appealed to corporate institutions and individuals to support the exercise by adopting any of the wards of the hospital for renovation to the appropriate standard and have them named after those companies and donors.

He said already, some individuals, churches and organisations had come on board to support but the enormity of the task required more of such institutions and organisations.

“Korle Bu is a national asset and an institution that has served so many people.

There is no family in Ghana that will say they have not benefited from Korle Bu.

It has served so many people so, if it’s a century old, let us all rally round and support it with our substance, contributions and ideas so that it takes its pride of place and continue to serve all of us,” he advised.

Theme

The theme for the anniversary celebration is: “100 Years of leadership in quality healthcare delivery, through training, research, innovation, and partnership”.

Dr Ampomah said the theme reflected how KBTH over the years had been the leader in the provision of healthcare in the country and stayed relevant  because it led through service delivery, training, research, innovation and partnerships across the board.

About Korle Bu

Built by Gold Coast Governor, Sir Gordon Guggisberg in 1923, KBTH started as a 200-bed hospital, the biggest in the country and remains as such till date. It is among the first four biggest hospitals in Africa, according to Dr Ampomah.

Currently, with almost 2,000 beds, it performs over 20,000 surgical operations every year, admits between 150 and 250 patients every day and sees outpatient attendance of between 1,500 and 2,500 daily.

The first medical school in the country was established at KBTH which is also a pioneer in nursing, midwifery, laboratory, radiology and all the different areas of training and these were some of the things Dr Ampomah cited as the hospital’s achievements.

“If you look at postgraduate training, KBTH was the main base of postgraduate training in all the specialities in the medical field and in all the other sub specialities in terms of postgraduate training for Allied Health professionals, nurses, critical care nursing training, and public health training.

“So Korle Bu has had a very huge footprint in the healthcare space of this country.

If you ask the general public if they know anyone or a relative who has been treated in Korle Bu, I’m sure every family would have some relative or friend who has been treated in Korle Bu before,” he said.

The hospital has also made many medical breakthroughs, including pioneering kidney and cornea transplantation as well as helping the late Japanese Researcher, Noguchi, with the discovery of yellow fever.

Other projects

Dr Ampomah mentioned other projects the hospital wanted to engage in as part of the anniversary as acquiring a new endoscopy building, giving a facelift to the obstetrics and gynaecology department, completing the new paediatric oncology unit and that of the diabetes centre.

The hospital is also  planning towards having a new 24-hour pharmacy, renovating staff bungalows and rehabilitating the sewerage or waste treatment plant.

On equipment, the KBTH CEO said management of the hospital was considering how they could cooperate with corporate institutions to bridge the gap—from hospital beds to the hings used for theatre work.

Under training, Dr Ampomah said as part of the anniversary, they intended training their staff to be conscious of customer care for them to be more courteous to patients and improve their customer experience of the hospital irrespective of their class or income levels.