St. John Of God Sefwi-Asafo, Commissions A New Accident & Emergency Unit
The geographical location of St. John of God Hospital, Sefwi-Asafo calls for readiness to prompt care to our clients. The Hospital serves as a referral centre for the northern belt of the Western Region. The other closest referral facility, Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, is more than 100 km from the St. John of God Hospital. Over the years the Hospital has been relying on a three-bed capacity for its emergency care. This caused a lot of problems to the unit’s staff in terms of emergency since adequate space is required to provide effective care. It also caused obvious frustrations to staff because they encountered cases they could attend to but had to refer due to inadequate space. Moreover, patients did not receive adequate resuscitation care before they were sent to the recovery wards owing to congestion at the unit. These, and in line with the Hospital’s mission of providing the best care necessitated the construction of a Twenty-Bed Accident and Emergency Unit.
Work on the new unit started in July 2015. The project initially moved at a slow pace due to inadequate funds. After few months, however, the French Brothers of the St. John of God Order, sharing in our desire and mission, came to our aid to sponsor the new structure due to the enormous impact it will make on patients’ care. With this kind gesture by the French Province, the building progressed quickly and work has been completed. It was inaugurated on October 21, 2016 to the glory of God.
With the Centre’s commissioning, the Hospital has entered a new era in emergency medical care that is more responsive to the patient need, enhanced patient experience and better serve the ever-increasing number of people seeking emergency medical care. The Hospital’s capacity to serve is thus poised to provide a 21st century emergency medical care to patients for many years to come.
The new block consists of the following units:
- A mini-theatre
- Intensive care unit
- Four washrooms for staff and patients
- A Private/VIP ward
- Male and Female Detention units.
- Staff office
- Clinical office
- Revenue collection point
- Examination room
Amongst the equipment available at the new unit are 4 wheel-chairs, 2 patients stretchers , 4 examination beds, 4 trolleys , a suction machine, 1 mobile oxygen cylinder, 1 stationary oxygen cylinder and 2 ambu bags. The theatre has operating bed, anaesthetic machine, theatre lump and heart table.
The Unit is connected to the national grid for electricity power supply, there is also a standby generator.
Nurses at the unit have undergone training on initial Assessment of Patients, Basic Life Support, and Advance Trauma Life Support, Management of Mass-Casualty.
The facility has a Specialist Surgeon and other medical doctors for Paediatrics, Obstetrics and Gynaecology. There are other prescribers in the hospital who are called upon at the emergency unit when the need be.The construction of the accident and emergency unit has dramatically changed the look of the Hospital’s landscape.
Financing
The building was financed by the French Province with contributions from the Hospital’s Internally Generated Funds.
Appreciation
We are very grateful for this huge support from the French Province which will go a long way to complement our efforts in providing quality healthcare to our patients. This will have a great positive impact on our healthcare delivery system.
We can promise that the building will be put to good use and constantly maintained for generations to come.
Br. John K. Oppong
Hospital Director
.