Health indicators positive in Ho Municipal area

The Ho Municipal area attained 91.1 per cent supervised deliveries in 2014, from 89.8 in 2013, Dr. Atsu Seake-Kwawu, Municipal Director of Health Services, said on Thursday.

This saw a reduction in maternal deaths from 19 in 2013 to 13 in 2014.

Dr. Seake-Kwawu, who was addressing an annual performance review of health facilities in the Municipality, said recorded maternal deaths from Ho stood at three in 2014.

The two-day performance review was on the theme, “Achieving excellence and improved service delivery outcomes through effective linkage between public health and clinical care.”

Dr. Seake-Kwawu referred to a protest by queenmothers in Ho in 2012 over alleged rising cases of maternal mortality at the Ho Municipal Hospital and said the combination of increased supervised deliveries and reduced institutional maternal deaths in recent time were indications that “we are moving in the desired direction.”

He said the Municipality continued to make progress in controlling diseases such as malaria, which had declined from 26.2 per cent in 2013 to 22.2 per cent in 2014.

“That is to say, although OPD attendance increased by seven per cent, malaria cases reported dropped by almost 14 per cent between the two years,” Dr Seake-Kwawu said.

He said HIV prevalence had also declined from 1.6 per cent in 2012 to 0.6 per cent in 2013.

Dr Joseph Teye Nuertey, Volta Regional Director of Health Services, in a speech read on his behalf, commended the Municipal Health Directorate for efforts at bringing down maternal mortality despite challenges in 2014.

He said the Regional Directorate was doing its best to improve health facilities in the Municipality and urged health workers not to be complacent so they could consolidate gains made.

Dr Nuertey said the Regional Directorate continued to receive complaints about poor attitude of health workers and said it was meaningless to reduce cases while clients expressed dissatisfaction with the attitude of health workers.

“If clients continue to complain, it means we didn’t achieve our targets. It is time to change our attitude towards our clients and the work we do,” he said.

Mrs Fafa Adinyira, the Ho Municipal Chief Executive, said the Assembly was working towards achieving some health related targets under the Millennium Development Goals.

She commended health workers and non-governmental organisations working in the health sector for health promotion in the Municipal area and reiterated the commitment of the Assembly to open more Community based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) compound in the Municipality.