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Ilorin, July 9, 2019 No fewer than 3,800 members of staff and students of the University of Ilorin have been covered by the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), the Nigeria News Agency reports.
Dr AbdulRasheed Odunola, Director of Health Services, University of Ilorin, made the disclosure at a symposium organised by Offa Students’ Union (OSU), University of Ilorin Chapter, on Tuesday in Ilorin.
NAN also reports that NHIS is one of the social security schemes established by the Federal Government to subsidise and promote healthcare delivery in the country.
Through the scheme, government bears cost of consultation and 90 per cent cost of drugs for treating each patient in registered hospitals, clinics and maternity centres, while the patient pays the remaining 10 per cent.
Odunola, while commending the Federal Government for the initiative and its commitment to the health of the nation’s workforce, charged state governments to emulate the Federal Government in order to bridge the healthcare service delivery gap.
In his remarks, Prof. Bayo Lawal, a former Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic) at the university, advised students to pay greater attention to their education, maintaining that knowledge acquisition remained the bedrock of success in life.
On the state of education in Nigeria, Lawal said that quality education was achievable in the country, especially under the atmosphere of good governance.
The former deputy vice-chancellor urged the institution’s students to aspire for leadership, noting that an individual must be known for something positive in order to be recognised by the people.
Edited by ‘Wale Sadeeq/Felix Ajide
Mr Runcie Chidebe, the Executive Director, Project Pink Blue, an NGO, has urged the Federal Government to make prostate cancer screening mandatory in all public hospitals.
Chidebe made the appeal while briefing newsmen on Thursday in Abuja.
He noted that the alarming incidence of prostate cancer in the society called for urgent intervention from relevant authorities.
He recommended that once a man of 40 years and above visited a hospital it was imperative for him to undergo a Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA) test, stressing that early detection is key for survival.
According to him, having compulsory prostate cancer test would help create awareness as well as reduce deaths associated with late detection.
He also suggested that companies should add prostate cancer screening in their insurance package and as well make life insurance mandatory just as it is for vehicle insurance.
Chidebe emphasised the need for the society to domesticate prostate cancer education materials in order to promote awareness on cancer risk factors, screening and early detection.
He further said that research conducted by his organisation found out that most Nigerian men over the age of 40 have not been screened for prostate cancer.
Chidebe decried low level of awareness as well as interest regarding the risk of prostate cancer as one of the factors that contribute to rise of the disease.
He added that only 40 percent of men who participated in the survey indicated interest in future yearly screening for prostate cancer which, he said, was not encouraging.
“There is no organised screenings or a national screening programme, what is currently available is sporadic screenings driven by non-profit and non-governmental organisations hosting medical missions in diverse communities.
“Only 13.8 per cent of Nigerian men have been screened for prostate cancer and out of 901 men only 124 have been checked for prostate cancer while 740 have not been screened.
“This result clearly explained the rationale for late detection of the disease and the increasing cancer deaths in the society.
“We found out also that most respondents make out of pocket payments for healthcare services which contributes to low screening turn out.
“Only 14.5 per cent and 4.2 per cent were covered by health insurance and their organisations, respectively,” he said.
Chidebe attributed these findings as some of the challenges faced by the Nigerian healthcare system which also slowed down the push for people to go for screening.
“This will slow the push to detect prostate cancer early as people may be discouraged from seeking professional health attention given the expected financial burden.
“In this study free PSA test was provided for all participants, however, PSA cost about N6,000 to N10,000.
“Prostate cancer treatment is a huge burden in Nigeria, a patient needs about N1.3 million to N3.3 million to treat prostate cancer and how many Nigerian men can afford it. Many of these indigent men will just decide to stay back home and die.
“With the poor national health insurance, it has become more financially stressful to cope with the burden of cancer in Nigeria because very few families can foot the bills of diagnosis, surgery and treatment,” he added.
He therefore urged the federal government to include cancer treatment in the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) programme in order to reduce financial burden on families.
Edited by Muhammad Suleiman Tola
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Lagos, April 4, 2019 The Healthcare Providers Association of Nigeria (HCPAN) on Thursday called for an urgent need to address the pressing national issues affecting the health sector, especially the health insurance axis.
Its National President, Dr Jimmy Arigbabuwo, made the call at a Special Extra-Ordinary NEC Meeting of the association on Thursday in Lagos.
According to Arigbabuwo, some of the key challenges facing the scheme, which is over 10 years in existence, include weak and politicised NHIS leadership and low uptake and coverage which is less than five per cent.
“It is saddening that the scheme has continued to experience diverse challenges.
“Some observed challenges include the absence or few enrollees in most facilities, poor distribution of enrollees and out of pocket payment is skyrocketing.
“While the country has continued to witness high morbidity and mortality rate, NHIS awareness is low in the communities, there are issues of poor funding and lack of IT infrastructures in facilities,’’ he said.
Arigbabuwo said that providers were impoverished, thereby leading to unhappiness.
“Stand-alone secondary provider facilities seem to be undermined and uncatered for by the present structure of some State Supported Health Insurance Scheme.
“Teaching Hospitals have taken over the bulk of enrollees and primary cases, thereby making them unable to adequately attend to referred tertiary cases, training and research for which they were established.
“There are occasional friction between enrollees and providers and dual roles of HMOs; also, there is HMO instability and impunity, with most of them owing providers for several months,” Arigbabuwo said.
He said that health insurance was not yet compulsory and the informal sector had yet to be covered by NHIS.
According to him, benefit package, tariff and operating guidelines are not in tune with the present economic realities and the sustainability and survival of providers.
Arigbabuwo called for improvement in actuarial studies and statistics and need to resolve the issue of the Certificate of Need.
“Tertiary institutions must be stopped from attending to primary cases and receiving capitation.
“ Tariff must be reviewed and done regularly to reflect the economic realities in the country; HMOs must be made to pay providers as and when due.
“Public enlightenment in various communities to improve public awareness of the NHIS should be undertaken by all stakeholders.
“Providers must be given a minimum of enrollees necessary to break even; providers to improve on their IT infrastructure. This will serve to improve keeping of data,’’ he said.
In his remarks, Mr Joshua Ajewole, National Secretary of HCPAN, said there was need for NHIS to be re-tolled in order to achieve Universal Health and Coverage (UHC) 14, as well as equitable distribution of enrollees.
“All stakeholders must come and work together to achieve results in the health sector.
Speaking with the News Agency of Nigeria , the Chairperson of HCPAN, Lagos State, Dr Ademola Aina, said providers were worried that health insurance had continued to crawl in Nigeria for over 10 years.
“There is need for various agencies and parastatals, especially the NHIS to sit up and make sure we get our acts right.
“The NHIS has been in and out of crises, and when there is crisis in any organisation, it doesn’t allow for maximum performance.
“In Lagos State, we are looking at the health insurance scheme, which has been launched newly; we expect it to actually allow Lagosians to have full access to healthcare.
“There are a lot of challenges and some points of conflicts between the scheme and providers.
“We are hoping that over time, those points of differences, we can narrow the gap and eventually sort out the problems.
“But, the key thing is that, let it start so that people can have unlimited access to healthcare,’’ Aina told NNN.
The National Orientation Agency (NOA) and National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) are collaborating to enhance healthcare delivery to Nigerians, especially at the grassroots.
Mr Garba Abari, the Director-General of NOA said this on Tuesday at a retreat organised by NHIS and NOA for state directors as well as other officers in Abuja.
“The partnership is expedient to ensure that majority of our citizens have access to quality and affordable healthcare services irrespective of their place of domain,’’ Abari said.
He tasked the state directors and officers to be ready to create awareness, enlightenment and educate Nigerians, especially at the grassroots on the benefits of registering with NHIS scheme.
“So it is now NOA’s responsibility to use our robust platform of its presence in all the 774 local government areas to communicate and sensitise the citizenry about this.
“The statutory responsibility of public enlightenment mass mobilisation and social re-orientation of citizens on all issues of public concern rests on the agency.
“Our members of staff are armed with relevant information to disseminate using the health orientation and other platforms of the agency.
“The education campaigns to increase knowledge and understanding of the NHIS are narrow and have not penetrated many communities where information about it was really needed.
“So the partnership will help to create overwhelming awareness and also change any negative attitude about the scheme,’’ Abari said.
He recommended that a comprehensive community consultation plan be established and implemented to increase awareness among community members.
Abari appealed that the consultation should include clinics, schools, pension pay points, cooperative associations, market men and women, okada riders and others.
“Studies have revealed that low income households are initially unwilling to subscribe to such health insurance scheme because they lack knowledge.
“They always think such programmes are for the rich and urban dwellers. So we need to change their belief.
“The degree to which knowledge influences utilisation, acceptability and smooth implementation of healthcare interventions have been investigated in other countries and found to be indeed relevant.
“There is an urgent need to improve on public knowledge on NHIS, its uptake and acceptability in Nigeria,’’ Abari said.
He promised that NOA would work closely with NHIS and offer assistance using its national advocacy footprint and time tested capacity for the grassroots.
Prof. Usman Yusuf, the Executive Secretary of NHIS said had resolved to partner with NOA to create awareness on the benefits of the scheme.
“NHIS has not reached the people they are meant to reach.
“A lot of people don’t know what we do, especially the ones in the rural communities, they assume the scheme is for the elites.
“It is quite unfortunate that after 11 years of establishing NHIS, it has only covered 3 to 4 per cent of the populace which makes me think we must have been doing the wrong thing.
“NHIS has the potential to make a difference in the life and healthcare delivery to our people.
“It creates an avenue where everyone can access health care irrespective of his financial capacity,’’ Yusuf said.
He stated that the robust platform of NOA would go a long way to educate, enlighten and create the very much needed awareness on the scheme at the grassroots.
“It has not used various channels to improve penetration; people have also not carried out advocacy visits.
“So NOA is an agency and channel that I think should be harnessed properly and strongly focused on.
Edited by: Tola Okinbaloye/Ese E. Ekama
(NAN)
