Ghana, since it independence from the British on 6 March 1957, has made great strides towards improving its health care facilities and the services offered in them. The Ghana Health Service, the health policy implementer of the Ministry of Health, has over the years developed the health care services offered to Ghanaians in the initial then (10) but now sixteen (16) administrative regions of the country. [1]
The regional hospitals in Ghana are tabulated below.
Region | Hospital Name |
---|---|
Western | Effia Nkwanta Regional Hospital, Sekondi |
Eastern | Regional Hospital, Koforidua |
Central | Central Regional Hospital, Cape Coast |
Northern | Tamale Regional Hospital |
Greater Accra | Ridge Regional Hospital, Ridge, Accra |
Bono | Regional Hospital, Sunyani |
Upper East | Regional Hospital, Bolgatanga |
Upper West | Regional Hospital, Wa |
Volta | Ho Teaching Hospital |
Ashanti | Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, Kumasi |
The Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital also known as GEE for it heavy equipments (KATH) in Kumasi, Ashanti Region, Ghana, is the second-largest hospital in Ghana, and the only tertiary health institution in the Ashanti Region.
Faith Community Nursing, also known as Parish Nursing, Parrish Nursing, Congregational Nursing or Church Nursing, is a movement of over 15,000 registered nurses, primarily in the United States. There are also Parish nurses in Australia, the Bahamas, Canada, England, Ghana, India, Kenya, Korea, Madagascar, Malawi, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Palestine, Pakistan, Scotland, Singapore, South Africa, Swaziland, Ukraine, Wales, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Faith community nursing is a practice specialty that focuses on the intentional care of the spirit, promotion of an integrative model of health and prevention and minimization of illness within the context of a community of faith. The intentional integration of the practice of faith with the practice of nursing so that people can achieve wholeness in, with, and through the population which faith community nurses serve.
In medicine, rural health or rural medicine is the interdisciplinary study of health and health care delivery in rural environments. The concept of rural health incorporates many fields, including geography, midwifery, nursing, sociology, economics, and telehealth or telemedicine.
Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH) is the premier health-care facility in Ghana. Located in the AblekumaSouth Metropolitan District in Accra. It is the only public tertiary hospital in the southern part of the country. It is a teaching hospital affiliated with the medical school of the University of Ghana. Three centres of excellence, the National Cardiothoracic Centre, the National Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery and the Radiotherapy Centres are all part of it. In 2019, the hospital gained a license from the Health Facilities Regulatory Agency (HeFRA), after meeting the requirement.
A clinical officer (CO) is a gazetted officer who is qualified and licensed to practice medicine.
The Ministry of Health (MoH) is the government ministry of Ghana that is responsible for the health of Ghana. It is involved in providing public health services, managing Ghana's healthcare industry, and building Ghana's hospitals and medical education system.
Healthcare in Ghana has taken many shapes throughout the country's history. In the precolonial period traditional village priests, clerics, and herbalists were the primary care givers, offering advice. The use of traditional healers persists mostly in rural regions of Ghana. The post-colonial period marks the beginning of government intervention on behalf of healthcare through a variety of policies on different government regimes. These policies culminate to the implementation of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS). The NHIS is currently serves people in both the formal and informal employment sectors and seeks to increase access to healthcare for all Ghanaians.
Tanzania has a hierarchical health system which is in tandem with the political-administrative hierarchy. At the bottom, there are the dispensaries found in every village where the village leaders have a direct influence on its running. The health centers are found at ward level and the health center in charge is answerable to the ward leaders. At the district, there is a district hospital and at the regional level a regional referral hospital. The tertiary level is usually the zone hospitals and at a national level, there is the national hospital. There are also some specialized hospitals that do not fit directly into this hierarchy and therefore are directly linked to the ministry of health.
The West End Hospital is a 40-bed private health care facility in Kumasi, Ghana. It is popularly known as the "Kwakye-Maafo Hospital" because of its distinguished services in fertility, obstetrics and gynaecology by the founder, Dr. J.K. Kwakye-Maafo, a medical practitioner and former president of the Ghana Medical Association.
The eye care system in Ghana can be said to be one in its infant or growing stages. Today there are less than 300 eye care professionals taking care of the eye needs of over 23 million Ghanaians.
Optometry is a relatively new field in eye care in Ghana.
The National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) was established by the government of Ghana in 2003. The program a form of national health insurance established to provide equitable access and financial coverage for basic health care services to Ghanaian citizens. Ghana's universal healthcare system has been described as the most successful healthcare system on the African continent by business magnate Bill Gates. The system has been found to have made Ghana's rate of health insurance one of the highest in Africa, though funding problems may complicate its future.
The Ghana Health Service (GHS) is a Ghanaian government body established in 1996 as part of the Health Sector Reform of Ghana. The Health Service is under the Ministry of Health. The Health service primarily administrates the health services provided by the government and in implementing government policies on healthcare. The Director-General of the Health service is Dr. Patrick Kuma-Aboagye.
The Presbyterian Church of Ghana is a mainline Protestant church in Ghana. The oldest, continuously existing, established Christian Church in Ghana, it was started by the Basel missionaries on 18 December 1828. The missionaries had been trained in Germany and Switzerland and arrived on the Gold Coast to spread Christianity. The work of the mission became stronger when Moravian missionaries from the West Indies arrived in the country in 1843. In 1848, the Basel Mission Church set up a seminary, now named the Presbyterian College of Education, Akropong, for the training of church workers to help in the missionary work. The Ga and Twi languages were added as part of the doctrinal text used in the training of the seminarians. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the Presbyterian church had its missions concentrated in the southeastern parts of the Gold Coast and the peri-urban Akan hinterland. By the mid-20th century, the church had expanded and founded churches among the Asante people who lived in the middle belt of Ghana as well as the northern territories by the 1940s. The Basel missionaries left the Gold Coast during the First World War in 1917. The work of the Presbyterian church was continued by missionaries from the Church of Scotland, the mother church of the worldwide orthodox or mainstream Presbyterian denomination. The official newspaper of the church is the Christian Messenger, established by the Basel Mission in 1883. The denomination's Presbyterian sister church is the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Ghana.
The Tamale Teaching Hospital is a Teaching hospital in Tamale in the Northern region and the third largest hospital in Ghana. It serves as a referral hospital for the five northern regions of Ghana. The main hospital in Northern Ghana, 2km southeast of town. It cooperates with the University for Development Studies in Northern Ghana to offer undergraduate and graduate programs in medicine, nursing and nutrition. It is the third teaching hospital in Ghana after the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital and the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital.
Disability in Ghana has a massive amount of stigma; children or people who are born disabled or deformed are assumed to be possessed by evil spirits.
Abortion in Ghana is legally permissible. The abortion should also be conducted only at a Government hospital; registered private hospital, clinics registered under the Private Hospitals and Maternity Homes Act, 1958 and a place approved by the Minister of Health by a Legislative Instrument. Illegal abortions are criminal offenses subject to at most five years in prison for the pregnant woman who induced said abortion, as well as for any doctor or other person who assisted this pregnant woman in accessing, or carrying out, an abortion. Attempts to cause abortions are also criminal, as are the purveyance, supply, or procurement of chemicals and instruments whose intent is to induce abortions.
The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted hospitals around the world. Many hospitals have scaled back or postponed non-emergency care. This has medical consequences for the people served by the hospitals, and it has financial consequences for the hospitals. Health and social systems across the globe are struggling to cope. The situation is especially challenging in humanitarian, fragile and low-income country contexts, where health and social systems are already weak. Health facilities in many places are closing or limiting services. Services to provide sexual and reproductive health care risk being sidelined, which will lead to higher maternal mortality and morbidity. The pandemic also resulted in the imposition of COVID-19 vaccine mandates in places such as California and New York for all public workers, including hospital staff.