More than 500 personnel of the National Hospital, Abuja (NHA), left its services in search of greener pastures in the last two years, its Chief Medical Director, Prof. Mahmud Raji, has disclosed.
Raji told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Sunday in Abuja that most of them went abroad in search of better working conditions.
“The way they leave is a very hurtful thing for all hospital administrators.
“The most pitiful and worrisome aspect of it is the amount of money the Nigerian government has invested into each of these individuals either a doctor, a nurse, a pharmacist, a physiotherapist or whoever it is that leaves.
He said that the brain drain syndrome was an almost everyday activity as he treats two or three files of young people wishing to leave.
“Sometimes, not only young people; some people have actually gone through the ranks with lots of experience that they could teach other people. So, Nigeria is losing so much, painfully.
“Here, we have lost a number of quite senior doctors, especially the middle cadre doctors, and the very young ones.
“Nurses have also left from the middle cadre and the younger ones. Some of our medical engineers are hotcakes outside and have left.
“I must tell you, Nigeria trains people so much, Nigerian graduates and staff are well sought after, all over,” he added.
On reasons for their departure, he said that remuneration and job satisfaction had always topped the list.
“For instance, if a doctor or a nurse comes here, he or she needs to see an environment that is quite serene, quite beautiful, even to rest in a very comfortable area during their one hour break.
“At least you are able to have something to eat, replenish your energy before you go back to the next phase of work, but usually, in our hospitals in Nigeria, we don’t have such.
“In terms of the remuneration, it may not be as good as what you would expect elsewhere. Even though I must say the purchasing power in Nigeria is far better than the purchasing power elsewhere and our money is still able to buy something.
“We should also look at the unsolved problem of inter-professional rivalry that also eats into people’s psyche. People should be comfortable with the next person they’re working with, be it a nurse, a physiotherapist or whoever.”
Raji also said that the necessary equipment needed to work were not there and when these equipment are either non-existent or obsolete, the healthcare practitioners feel that more should have been done.
He, however, said that past governments had tried by taking very decisive stance on matters of health.
The current government has also put in a lot to rejig the health sector, he added.