The Scholarship Secretariat has met with stakeholders in the medical training sector to brainstorm on how to invest locally in training medical personnel here in the country.
The move, among others, is to ensure that a lot of people get the opportunity to be sponsored by the Secretariat to have their medical training in the country.
The opportunity will be created through limiting the number of students who travel abroad on scholarship to study medicine and rather invest the funds in local medical training.
Organised at the behest of the Vice President, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, the stakeholders’ engagement in local medical training took place yesterday, in Accra, under the chairmanship of the Registrar of the Ghana Scholarship Secretariat, Mr Kingsley Agyemang.
In his welcome address, the Registrar acknowledged that by virtue of the mandate of the Secretariat, they cannot undertake physical infrastructure for the purpose of the discussion, but can only help with funds.
The funding, he explained, would then become a very good source of income for the medical facilities to be able to develop on their own.
“We have seen from the books that training Ghanaians outside the country, on the average costs not less than US$15,000 per annum. I believe that if we are able to get it a bit cheaper here, we will be able to increase the capacity of our people,” the Registrar remarked.
He outlined the various enrolments his sector has undertaken in the last three years, for instance, the increase in enrolment, while arguing further that should those funds remain in the country, local facilities would benefit.
He recalled that: “Last two years we sent about 330 (GNPC sent 230, we sent 100) students to Cuba. So, you can see that there is a lot in terms of enrolment and that, if we are able to retain this amount here, it will be good for all of us. I believe that may be in the next 10 to 15 years when some medical training facilities can boldly come up and say that their contribution to medical training is of this magnitude of money, so that, we are able to stop this capital flight.”
Stressing that the Secretariat is solely a central government funded institution, Mr Kingsley Agyemang indicated that when there are economic challenges, as seen with COVID-19, it affects the Secretariat, which is fed by the central government.
Enlightening further on the scholarship, vis-à-vis having medical personnel to work in the hinterlands across the country, Mr Agyemang stated that the process would be such that the bonding system would compel beneficiaries to do their job in local areas.
“The books also inform us that the majority of practitioners are either in Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, 37 Military Hospital or Greater Accra Regional Hospital, Ridge.
“Which means that at the very basic unit we are lacking, therefore, if every year we are able to have some good numbers of our people from the districts being selected for scholarships in medical training, where they are bonded, such that at the end of their training their district hospital becomes their referral point – that’s where they are going to start their job, I believe we will be able to retain knowledge and capital at the basic level,” he opined.
Representing the Minister for Health, Dr Baffour Awuah said that the vision of the ministry is to decentralize its operations and improve healthcare delivery, which needs manpower, bearing in mind the issue of no bed syndrome, among others.
He indicated that the Minister had asked before how medical personnel could be trained locally and has initiated steps towards that.
“So, the Minister is in full agreement of this meeting and he is going to engage the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development for all of them to bring their heads together on how we can improve on local training,” he added.
The Rector of the Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons, Dr Richard Adanu, drew the attention of the stakeholders to first know how many doctors the country would have to produce to meet the national needs, in the areas of undergraduate medical and specialist training.
Again, he stated that if the country intends to do all the training locally, “it is important that the funds that we are currently putting into training people externally is available for local training.
Other representatives of various medical facilities in the country took turns to share ideas on the subject.
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