The Korlebu Teaching Hospital is to introduce another type of dialysis for renal patients called peritoneal dialysis which is said to be more patient friendly.
When introduced it will reduce the hospital time of patients. CEO of Korlebu Teaching Hospital, Dr. Opoku-Ware Ampomah who disclosed this to GBC News, said currently renal patients receive only hemodialysis because special fluids for peritoneal dialysis are not readily available.
“Peritoneal dialysis, what happens is that there’s some special fluid that is introduced back through a catheter into your abdominal cavity and the fluid causes your body to exchange the waste substances, then the fluid is now drained out. This is something that patients can be taught to do on their own at home. And so it is cheaper in the long run. And it doesn’t involve the people having to come to the hospital. They only come to the hospital periodically for some checkups and so on”
Dr. Ampomah said Atlantic Sciences, a pharmaceutical company has come on board to produce the special fluids locally, which will be a giant step in renal patient care in the country.
“To import them was also a bit of a challenge. But then in our engagements, with Atlantic Life Sciences, which is one of the pharmaceutical companies in the Tema area which came on board and have started production of this fluid.
Dr. Ampomah who expressed regret about the frequent shortages of dialysis consumables, was hopeful that it is going to be a thing of the past following procurement of additional 30 dialysis machines for the hospital by the government.
He said the capacity of staff would be built to effectively manage the machines. Dr. Ampomah also hinted that the hospital on its own is in the process of purchasing more dialysis machines to augment what is available.
By Rachel Kakraba