The four-member team during the visit will also assess the hospital’s facilities, capability and readiness to train radiologists in the country. The West African College of Surgeons is a professional organisation that promotes education, training, examinations and research in surgery in Africa.
Giving a synopsis of the visit, Prof. Tinu Agunloye, professor of Radiology and head at the Department of Radiology at the Edward Francis Small Teaching Hospital, said the day was a joyous occasion for the hospital and the country as a whole, as the country’s referral hospital for the first time had received a panel that came to assess their capability and readiness to train radiologists in the country.
“Prior to this, we’ve only been able to train one radiologist, who went to Ghana to train and she is still there,” he pointed out. “But from now, hopefully with all the things put on the ground through the help of the Ministry and The Gambia government, we have invited the team from the West African College of Surgeons to come and assess our facilities. ‘Inshallah’, we will be able to commence our training of our doctors while they are working and providing services to the people.”
For his part, Prof. A.O. Adeyinka, a professor of Radiology at the College of Medicine at the University of Ibadan, Nigeria, who doubles as a consultant Radiologist at the University College Hospital, Ibadan in Nigeria, said they were in the country on behalf of the Faculty of Radiology under the West African College of Surgeons.
He informed that the College is a body whose mandate is to train and provide human capacity development programmes in the West African sub-region.
“The body also ensure that facilities that are essential to support those trainings are made available,” he said. “Today, we have come to the Radiology Department at Edward Francis Small Teaching Hospital to appraise the training programmes that would be on the ground once the accreditation of the hospital is granted. We are happy to be here and we want to thank the Ministry and Government of The Gambia for the support that they have given to the hospital to be able to put the radiology training programme on course.”
Prof. Adeyinka also thanked the World Bank for their support, acknowledging that without their support most of the facilities on the ground wouldn’t have been possible.
He expressed optimism that by the end of the appraisal mission they would be able to accredit the hospital, stressing that there are standards along the way that would not be compromised.
Reacting to the development, Dr Ammar Al Jafari, Chief Medical Director at the EFSTH, said he was delighted with the development, and equally described the day as another milestone in achievement in the annals of the hospital.
He said granting the hospital an accreditation in Radiology speaks volumes of the hospital’s quest to ensure quality health services to the citizenry, adding that it also signifies that the hospital has qualified departments and equipment.
CMD Jafari recalled that for a long time the hospital had no accreditation in view of the fact that it had not got all the necessary equipment.
“Now, we have fixed all the equipment - like CT Scan, MRI, Ultrasound machines, digital X-Ray and Mammography,” he assured, saying: “So we have all the equipment that they requested and we also have the technicians and consultants.”
