Nigeria can become a reference country for treatment of spinal cord and brain injury following the training and certification of the University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital (UPTH) as a graded centre for Spine Physiotherapy.
This is as experts have blamed delays and poor handling of accident victims for increasing number of spinal injury and paralysis in Nigeria. Sources in the UPTH said at the 2017 Spinal Cord Injury Day (SCID) that most cases coming into the specialist hospital in the Garden city come from accident victims.
An assistant director of physiotherapy, Ime Ubom, said at the SCID event marked by experts at Zitadel Medicals and Diagnostics Limited at Trans-Amadi that the resource persons at the UPTH had been trained by experts from the US and certified as far back as 2012.
According to Ubom, the centre is manned by highly skilled and passionate experts who have posted what he called very surprising results. He urged hospitals to send down difficult cases there.
The assistant director testified about a complicated case taken severally abroad but that was eventually treated successfully at the certified centre in the UPTH. He said most of those who rush to India for spinal cord surgeries usually lacked one-on-one attention with their doctors critically needed in spinal cord injuries and end up needing home-based attention.
As he put it, soon, Nigeria would become a reference country for spinal cord and brain surgery cases due to advances in that sector in medical practice.
In his opening remarks, an Abuja-based consultant spine surgeon from brain/spine surgery consortium (BASS), Biodun Ogungbo, said the day was being marked by the seminar seeking ways to remove obstacles to spinal cord injury patients in Nigeria. He said the effort was geared towards working with the public sector (government) on removing the obstacles.
Answering numerous questions from patients and resource persons, Ogungbo allayed fears about the implants made of titanium to stabilize the neck and backs of patients, saying they stay well with the body. He however said new advances have introduced carbon-based implants that dissolve into the bones later.
The expert warned against crude massaging, twerking and other improper ways of tampering with the vertebrae, saying the place was very sensitive. He said there efforts to create collaboration to tackle the menace of spinal cord injury.
A consultant orthopedic surgeon, Eyimina Phillip with the UPTH, warned against excessive use of pain killers, saying it could distort the ability of the brain to record where there is problem in the system.
He frowned against delays in handling accident victims, saying often, they lose valuable time in getting the patient to hospital. He also said those who meet accident victims first should ask to find out if they had pains in the neck and if they could move their fingers and toes, saying inability to do so could be signs of spinal cord injury.
He harped on proper ways to handle fresh spinal cord victims at accident scenes and how to use newspapers, shirts and hard boards to move a victim. He said pulling a victim about could worsen the spinal cord injury.
Peter Sofiri, president, Rotary Club of Port Harcourt Down Town and chairman, National Association of Government General Medical and Dental Practitioners, said attention should focus on preventive measures. He frowned at how persons cross roads carelessly and harped on how the public and private sectors could collaborate to save more lives. He also said those who go to India for specialist medical attention were handled by private hospitals, insisting that time had come for private sector medical practice to lead in the quest for medical tourism in Nigeria.
He said a road show (walk) would be organised to raise awareness on the matter to awaken Nigerians on the need to respond properly to spinal cord injuries. Others called for larger audience on future seminars.
A physiotherapist from Optimal Health Centre in Port Harcourt, Okafor Chukwuebuka, gave a breakdown of how victims were being handled in Nigeria and the hopes that lie ahead.
Ignatius Chukwu & Fortune Okorie
