Patients at Ogur health Center IV (Northern Uganda
These were just a cross section of patients at Ogur health center IV where health centers open up late (10:00am), high number of patients becomes much more difficult to handle because most health facilities do not work on patients has they come but do wait for patients to turn up in large numbers. Has a solution to this challenge, Transparency International Uganda field staffs have been holding advocacy and management meetings that seek to empower the health workers, informing and involving heath management in taking up key responsibilities in health management.- During these meetings, health workers were found to be opening the facilities late because they say patients do report late at the health centers; even if they opened early enough they would have no one to work on, others were found to be attending to their personal businesses and also having negative attitude towards their work, an attitude derived from need for more payments; In response to late arrival/opening of health centers, the health workers were made to understand that they are under contract to open the health facility latest by 8:00am, whether the patients are there or not, the health center should be opened and staffs ready to work, opening and arrival time shouldn’t be dependent on availability of health users. Health workers have also been encouraged to love their job no matter how little the payments may be, conditions may be hard but the work that health workers do is more humanitarian and God given.
We call upon all health workers and health users to take part in health service delivery monitoring at their respective health center, for its all our duty to ensure that people are held socially accountable and health sector is free from corruption. Call Transparency International Uganda for free on 0800200188 and report health challenges at your respective health centers in Northern Uganda.