The Manager of the Western Regional Medical Stores, Oscar Amissah, says\u00a0the number of mentally challenged persons scattered\u00a0on the streets, may escalate due to the absence of medication to cater for mentally challenged persons in the region.<\/p>\n
According to him, the absence of mental health drugs at the Regional Medical Stores, coupled with their high\u00a0cost, poses a threat to mental health care in the country.<\/p>\n
“The state of the supply of the drugs is not the best. So far we are operating with about eight\u00a0medicines from the temporal central medical stores. But we treat different kinds of cases that require more than the eight\u00a0medicines, and even with the eight, not all are constantly supplied.\u201d<\/p>\n
Explaining the inadequate supply situation,\u00a0Mr. Amissah noted that \u201cwe have been here for the last four years due to lack of adequate funding in this area. This has resulted in the Health ministry\u2019s inability to meet our requisitions\u201d.<\/p>\n
Mr. Amissah, who was speaking at the maiden annual Mental Health Sub-Committee Performance Review in Takoradi, debunked suggestions that the shortage has come about as a result of the fire that destroyed the\u00a0Central Medical Stores in Tema last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s mainly the lack of funding because even before that unfortunate incident, this situation existed. The Pharmacist in charge of the Psychiatric Unit has been talking about this on other networks for long. The problem is\u00a0funding also because the drugs are expensive but are given to the patients free of charge. Some amount of funding has to go in there; but unfortunately it\u2019s an area where whenever there are budgetary cuts, it is affected.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile the Coordinator for the Western Regional Mental Sub-Committee, Charles Dzigbedor, noted that the Mental Health Sub-committee would\u00a0have to work hard to extend mental health coverage to all the 477 health facilities in the 22 districts of the region.<\/p>\n
\u201cMental health services are currently provided in only 24 facilities out of the 477 in 17 of the 22 districts in the region. But looking at the total number of facilities in the region, it means there is a lot of deficit which the sub-committee is looking for ways to augment or fill those gaps,” he noted.<\/p>\n
Mr. Dzigbedor also appealed for more personnel to help the committee execute its mandate efficiently.<\/p>\n
“We also need to have more staff to add up to the 60 staff members\u00a0in the region to help us implement and execute the committee\u2019s mandate.\u201d<\/p>\n
The\u00a0Regional Mental Health Sub-Committee also expressed its commitment at collecting useful data on the mental health situation from all the 477 private and public health facilities in the region.<\/p>\n
–<\/p>\n
By\u00a0Obrempong Yaw Ampofo\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Manager of the Western Regional Medical Stores, Oscar Amissah, says\u00a0the number of mentally challenged persons scattered\u00a0on the streets, may escalate due to the absence of medication to cater for mentally challenged persons in the region. According to him, the absence of mental health drugs at the Regional Medical Stores, coupled with their high\u00a0cost, poses […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,11],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n