OAUTH and its Rare Feat

In a rare medical feat, the Obafemi Awolowo
University Teaching Hospital Complex, OAUTH, Ile
Ife, Osun State, has carried successful paediatric
open-heart surgeries on six children including five
with holes in the heart.
The children, who are from various parts of the
country including Ilesa and Ikire in Osun State, Akure
(Ondo State), Warri (Delta State), Offa (Kwara State)
and Port-Harcourt (Rivers State), had the surgeries
performed on them between Tuesday, April 26 and
Sunday, May 1, 2016.
The Chief Medical Director, OAUTH, Professor Victor
Adetiloye, who disclosed this to Vanguard said
another 20 children are already slated for June-July
2016 for open heart surgeries, which for now, the
hospital hopes to perform routinely, at least quarterly.
“This is an accomplishment of our dreams and
visions seeing that this is possible in Ile-Ife,”
Adetiloye remarked, even as he commended the
medical team comprising cardiothoracic surgeons,
led by Drs. Akin Ogunrombi and Uvie Onakpoya, a
paediatric cardiologist, Dr. John Okeniyi, an Open
Heart Task Force, operating theatre nurses, and a
host of other departmental staff of the hospital
including the Dean, Faculty of Clinical Sciences,
OAU, Ile-Ife, who freely donated blood.
Adetiloye, who regretted the high incidence of
cardiac diseases and its contribution to poor health
status and low life expectancy in the country, said it
was in the bid to stem the tide, that the Management
of OAUTH, Ile-Ife, over the past years invested
heavily in the procurement of equipment,
consumables and the training of personnel to be able
to diagnose and treat heart diseases both medically
and surgically.
He said the impact of heart diseases both acquired
and congenital which hitherto were considered as
exoteric and uncommon is on the rise.
“In fact, the World Health Organization estimates that
to be able to treat the heart diseases in any country,
at least 400 open heart surgeries need to be
performed for every one million population yearly.
“Assuming Nigeria’s current population is 170 million
people, this means Nigeria should be performing at
least 68,000 heart surgeries every year.
“Until this year, the OAUTH runs both adult and
paediatric cardiology services and routinely perform
closed cardiac surgeries such as Trans-thoracic PDA
ligations, pericardectomies, pacemaker implantations
and various other forms of closed surgical operations
on the heart, blood vessels and the chest, but the
desire to move up to start performing open heart
surgeries spurred the management on the leadership
of the current Chief Medical Director, two years ago
to set up a task force for open heart surgery headed
by Professor M.O. Balogun, a renowned adult
cardiologist,” Adetiloye remarked.
To this end, the Hospital entered into a partnership
with the Cardiac Eye International Foundation, a
foreign NGO headed by Prof. Maqsood Elahi.
“An 8½-month-old female infant with congenital
rubella syndrome referred from Delta State was the
recipient of the first exploratory interaction between
the Hospital and the Cardiac Eye International
Foundation. In December 2015, she underwent a
simultaneous PDA closure and repair of her bilateral
cataracts successfully,” the CMD noted.
He said the OAUTHC is poised to become a referral
centre for cardiac surgery in the West African sub
region and also become a training institution for the
various cadres of staff involved in open heart
surgery.

Source: Sola Ogundipe; Vanguard News