COWLSO DONATES ICU TO ISLAND MATERNITY

The Committee of Wives of Lagos State Officials, COWLSO, has donated an ultra-modern Intensive Care Unit to the Lagos Island Maternity, just as the wife of the Governor and Chairman of the Committee; Mrs. Bolanle Ambode promised that the group would continue to partner the State government, to end mother and child mortality.

 

She said the ICU project was focus of COWLSO’s health intervention for this year, along with neo-natal hearing screening equipment donated to Gbagada General Hospital, Ikorodu General Hospital, Badagry General Hospital and Ifako-Ijaiye General Hospital, all in Lagos State.

 

Mrs. Ambode noted that late referral of emergency baby delivery cases from traditional birth attendants and faith-based homes to government’s health facilities, had become a major challenge, requiring the services of an ICU, to save endangered mothers and their babies.

 

She said, “Now and then, we hear of many pregnant women and their babies dying of conditions such as pregnancy-induced hypertension and convulsion or shock arising from post-delivery bleeding. A good number of such cases come in extreme conditions, which without the existence of a well-equipped intensive care unit, death seems inevitable for the mother, baby or both”.

 

“Here lies the wisdom in COWLSO’s intervention, in upgrading and strengthening the existing High Dependency Unit, to an ultra-modern Intensive Care Unit, to cope with increased number and complexity of emergency cases”, she stressed.

 

According to her, “COWLSO in the present dispensation is fully committed to the safe Motherhood Project and partnering the health facilities, to ensure that no life is lost in pregnancy and during delivery”.

 

She noted that the donation of an ICU is in furtherance of previous year’s donation of  neo-natal screening equipment for preventive aspect of hearing impairment and   early screening of newborns for possible hearing defects.

 

The COWLSO Chairman said, “According to the World Health Organization, 60% of childhood hearing loss is preventable, hence our continuous intervention. The consequences of not addressing hearing loss in children include difficulty in speech acquisition, delayed language development, academic under achievement, social isolation, higher risk injuries and increased poverty”.

 

She therefore commended the cooperation and support of COWLSO members, the health institutions and equipment suppliers, while urging expectant mothers to always use ante-natal services for smooth baby delivery.

 

In his own remarks, the Commissioner for Health, Dr. Jide Idris, who noted that the Island Maternity recorded about 400 deliveries monthly, promised that professional update courses would be provided to run the unit, hinting that the State’s Strategic Health Development Plan envisioned the phased creation of zonal High Dependency Units to serve emergency obstetric cases.

 

The Commissioner added that, the revamping of the audiology unit of the ENT clinic at the General Hospital Lagos, last year by COWLSO, has had tremendous positive impact on residents with hearing impairment from cradle to adults.

 

He commended the committee for the noble gesture, calling on well-meaning individuals and groups, to emulate them by partnering the government in the mission to provide quality health care services to the citizenry.

 

Also speaking, Chairman of the Lagos State House of Assembly Committee on Health, Hon. Segun Olulade, commended COWLSO, for complementing the efforts of the government, to achieve new levels of healthcare delivery for Lagosians.

 

He said: ‘I must confess that COWLSO has introduced a new dimension to humanitarian service. I can still remember when the committee donated the first state-of-the-art Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) equipment to the General Hospital, Odan and conducted major goiter surgery for over 30 adults’.

 

He implored expectant mothers to take full advantage of the facilities and urged health workers to handle them with care.

 

Responding on behalf of the General Hospitals that received the hearing screening equipment, the Chief Medical Director of Ikorodu General Hospital, Dr. Bankole Olufunmilayo, applauded COWLSO and the Governor’s wife for the intervention, stressing that the equipments would enable the benefitting hospitals screen the newborns for possible hearing defects.