 |
Gene expert machines, a new diagnosis tool in some selected primary healthcare centres to enhance treatment of tuberculosis (TB), Prof. Isaac Adewole, Nigeria's Health Minister said on Tuesday in Abuja.
He was present at the National Conference on Tuberculosis organised by Stop TB Partnership Nigeria in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Health with the theme “Hidden Face of Tuberculosis: Challenges in Identification and Management Among Vulnerable Groups in Nigeria.”
According to him, government has identified 287 centres and health teams across the country are trying to map out the 111 out of the 287 identified Primary Healthcare Centres.
He said “the pilot centres can serve as proof of what we plan to do in the next two years.”
He added that the ministry was working with World Health Organisation (WHO), UNICEF and World Bank to train human resource needs for the Primary Healthcare Centres.
“We are looking at the concept where we have at least 19 workers with six major healthcare workers in a primary health centre so that we can interface with communities.
“We need to go to people’s homes and pick out TB from there, if we can improve the diagnosis, we will also improve the treatment and make sure that we wipe out TB.
“What we need is support and we believe that we can get it.”
Meanwhile, Dr Gidado Mustapha, the Country Director, Challenge TB/KNCV an NGO, said the TB testing machine which was highly sensitive was faster than the microscope, adding that a total of 215 of such machines were current in the country.
Mustapha said the machines had assisted in testing over 30,000 patients.
“It has help to improve TB case finding among people living with HIV/AIDS by 17 per cent,” he said.
(Press release from the News Agency of Nigerian)
No comments:
Post a Comment