A walk into the female ward of the Ondo Trauma Centre on a Monday
afternoon, you would not but notice the calm and beautiful 51-years-old
Omotola Adeyemi as she sat pensively on the remote controlled
orthopaedic bed at the female ward. She must be thinking about the night
of February 16th 2014 and how she and her husband ended up at the
Trauma Centre on their way from a social function.
Approaching her to speak with her must have reminded her of that
silent and sorrowful night, the night of February 16th 2014. At first
she declined talking to journalists, but when persuaded by one of the
Doctors, she decided to speak off camera in an emotion-laden voice.
Mr. Oluwagbemiga Adeyemi, Accident victim rushed to the Trauma Centre
When Omotola Adeyemi and her husband, Oluwagbemiga Adeyemi left their
home in Ondo town on February 16th, 2014 to attend a function in
Okitipupa in the Southern part of Ondo state which is less than 2-hour
drive from Ondo town, little did the couple know that they won’t be
returning to their home for weeks, they would have doubted the
possibility of being in their neighbourhood for 2-months without getting
to their abode.
The Adeyemi’s case was an unusual one, not many lived to tell the
story, most times people stand in twos, threes and fours to tell such
story after the demise of those involved, those are the kind of stories
that make front page of national dailies with the headline “couple die
in auto-crash after attending funeral”
Unlike Mrs Adeyemi who declined speaking with journalist, her husband
Mr Oluwagbemiga Adeyemi seems to have put the past behind him and moved
on with life. There was sign of enthusiasm boldly inscribed on his face
as he spoke with this journalist.
“While coming back from Okitipupa where I and my wife went to attend a
friend’s function, between Okitipupa and Ore, we had a very serious
accident. I had a broken leg and my wife’s two legs were broken too, the
car also got burnt, then we had a passer-by who came to our rescue and
took us to Okitipupa General Hospital from where we were transferred to
Trauma Centre here in Ondo.” He said
The Adeyemi’s were full of praises to the Ondo state Governor, Dr
Olusegun Mimiko, not only for the construction of the Ondo
Trauma Centre, but for also equipping it with sophisticated medical
equipments and qualified medical personnel.
Mrs Adeyemi said “if we were taken to Federal Medical Centre at Owo
or the University Teaching Hospital at Ife that night, we probably would
have died. I appreciate the Governor for this institution, it is really
saving lives.”
Corroborating his wife, Mr Adeyemi said “We thank God for enabling
the Governor to build this institution, this is really saving a lot of
lives, it’s saving the citizenry from a lot of problems, in terms of
giving accident victims prompt and efficient medical service. We want to
appreciate God and the Governor for putting up this kind of institution
here. If not for this centre here, the two of us would have died that
night.”
“When we got here, immediately we were taken to the theatre where an
operation was conducted on us and it was successful. We went for two
operations and they were successful. There are adequate equipment in the
hospital, the Doctors were up and doing and they lived to
expectations.
Doctors at the Theatre performing surgical operation on Maxwell
In a circumstance not too different from the Adeyemi’s story, is the
case of 42-years-old Maxwell Asoro, an indigene of Delta state and
a Ph.D holder, who was also involved in an auto accident in Lagos, but
had to relocate to the Ondo Trauma Centre after lack of improvement at
the private hospital where he was been treated in Lagos.
“I had an accident in 2013 and I’ve undergone different surgeries at a
Private Hospital in Lagos, but the surgery failed. A friend of mine
then recommended this place and I came from Lagos.
“I was admitted here in March 2014, and I had undergone two
surgeries, one on my tibia (bone elongation) and I had partial rip
replacement, I’m recuperating right now and I hope to be discharged in a
few days from now.
“When I came I was marvelled with what I saw here in terms of the
care and the facilities. My coming here from Lagos is really worth it”
said a highly elated Maxwell.
Like many other patients at the centre, 28-years-old Omolara Fadayomi
was excited at the construction of the Trauma Centre in Ondo, saying
that with the establishment of the centre “the rate of casualty being
recorded in road crashes in Ondo state and other neighbouring states
will surely reduce drastically, if the people can find their way to the
centre.”
One would have wondered what could have prompted the Governor
Olusegun Mimiko-led Ondo State Government to build such facility with
standard and up to date medical equipments, but with the Federal Road
Safety Corps, FRSC’s, scary statistics on road crashes in Nigeria, it is
therefore easy to understand the need for an Ondo Trauma Centre and
many of such facilities in other parts of the country.
According to the Head, Policy, Research and Statistics Department of
the FRSC, Dr Kayode Olagunju, between 1960 and 2012, some 1,060,507
crashes were recorded in Nigeria, with 322,427 deaths and 1,016,299
injuries.
“In 2012 alone, there was a report of a total of 4,260 deaths on
Nigerian roads; an average of 12 persons died daily and with 20,752
injured.
“Hence, on the average, 69 persons were either injured or killed on
our roads daily; 48,114 persons were involved in 6,269 documented
cases.” Olagunju said
In cases where accident victims manage to survive the crashes,
aggravation of their woes by their rescuers, the proximity of an
hospital to the accident site, which, in many cases, is always far away
and lack of access to modern and standard medical facilities like the
ones at the Ondo Trauma Centre, are some of the factors which lead to
the death of the little who manage to survive the crashes.
Having put all these into consideration and to combat this challenge,
the Chief Medical Director of the Ondo Trauma Centre, Dr Olugbenga Ige,
an Orthopedic and Spine Surgeon, noted that “We have Advanced Life
Support Ambulances on the highways located in stations specially
constructed to allow these ambulances to easily access the highways and
cover the length of the highways where they are located.
“When there is an accident, we have toll free numbers that people can
call to get direct access to our call centre and notify us of an
accident, when we get the calls, these ambulances that are stacked with
paramedics, the extricators, and rescuers get to the scene of accident
within 15 minutes, and professionally rescue victims from a wreckage of
accident, such that they do not aggravate the degree of injury sustained
and actually give them chances to survive, due to the extent of injury
they’ve sustained and properly transport them to where the injury can be
properly cared for.”
Highlighting some of the distinct features that make the ambulance
standout among other kinds of ambulance, the CMD said; “In
the ambulances, we have advanced life support gadgets, in addition we’ve
also trained ordinary citizens to be first respondents, there is an
ongoing campaign on that and we are still recruiting more people into
the system.”
Bearing in mind that the desired result cannot be achieved with Ondo
Trauma Centre alone, which is located at the Central part of the state,
and to ensure that accident victims are promptly and appropriately
attended to in a well-equipped facility, the state government have also
upgraded the accident and emergency unit of general hospitals across the
state to handle to a great extent, some level of injuries and the apex
of this hospital system is the Trauma centre at Ondo.
“With our well equipped facility, when an accident victim gets to
this hospital they are promptly and appropriately attended to, and
irrespective of the nature or severity of injuries sustained by victims,
once they get here, they are given a genuine chance of survival,” Ige,
who sits atop the world class 100-bed medical facility, boasted.
Despite the qualified and well trained personnel and the state of the
art equipments available at the centre, the cost of treatment is
affordable to all class of citizens.
Female Ward of Ondo Trauma and Surgical Centre
Governor Mimiko had, in his second term inaugural address, stated
that one of the major aims of building the Trauma Centre is to
“drastically reduce the toll of trauma especially Road Traffic Accident
on our people.”
First with the Mother and Child Hospital in Akure in 2010 and Ondo in
2012, which has drastically reduced infant and maternal mortality in
the state, Mimiko’s success in the health sector cannot be
over-emphasised, many a times it has been echoed and re-echoed in the
media such that the Abiye Safe Motherhood has become an household name
in Nigeria and beyond, not only that, the initiative has also won him
local and global awards and accolades.
While many have attributed Mimiko’s success in the health sector to
his background as a Medical Doctor, many have attributed the success to
his political will to provide quality health care for the people at zero
and affordable cost.
The yet-to-be-commissioned Ondo Trauma has been accredited for Post
Graduate Residency Training in Radiology and Anaesthesia by the West
African College of Surgeons (WACS) and National Postgraduate Medical
College of Nigeria (NPMCN). Local and International experts have however
noted that the centre is now a model for other states in the country
and in the Africa continent.
