Enhancing Nigerian Healthcare With Traditional Medicine - Dr Bunmi Omoseyindemi

Lagos State government is growing traditional medicine to support its health care delivery system.
Chairman, Lagos State Traditional Medicine Board (LSTMB) Dr Bunmi Omoseyindemi made this known at a workshop for tradition medicine practitioners and health workers in the private sector.
The workshop was held in conjunction with a United Kingdom (UK) based organisation, Department for International Development’s (DFID’s) Partnership for Transforming Health Systems II (Part 2) at Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) in Ikeja.
Dr Omoseyindemi said DFID is contributing to effective and efficient use of the nation’s resources to achieve the health-related Millennium Development Goals 4 and 5.
He said: “The capacity building would help develop traditional and alternative medicine practice so that they would be able to support the healthcare delivery system in the state, as the Ministry of Health would need accurate data in planning some of its policies and improving on health indices.
“The workshop will also ensure there is improvement in the quality of healthcare.”
Five Local Government Areas (LGAs) would serve as the launch pad for health workers in the private sector. They are Amuwo-Odofin, Alimosho, Kosofe, Ibeju Lekki and Ikorodu LGAs.
Omoseyindemi said the baseline assessment of orthodox medicine practitioners, traditional birth attendants (TBAs), patent medicine vendors and community pharmacists have been conducted, adding, “the training needs of practitioners were identified based on the maternal death review report from secondary and tertiary hospitals.”
The LSTMB, he said, was supported to develop its electronic database for entry of community level data.
He said before the capacity training, the board and the Lagos State College of Health Technology (LASCOHET) have reviewed the curriculum for TBAs and community birth attendants’ training programme.
The Chairman also said the board had trained some practitioners on six priority diseases in West Africa as directed by the West African Health Organisation (WAHO). The diseases are hypertension, diabetes, sickle cell anaemia, HIV/AIDS and Tuberculosis (TB) and malaria.
The objective is to train practitioners on the use of herbs and preparation methods following the guidelines in the region’s Herbal Pharmacopoeia.
The Board, he said, also collaborated with a non-governmental organisation (NGO) based in the United States, the Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) to train 1,115 TBAs on childhood diseases, such as diarhoea management.
“The objective was to empower them to become diarhoea champions in their various communities by educating mothers under their care on the proper use of zinc plus oral rehydration salt (ORS) for the effective management of the condition, which accounts for 11 per cent of childhood deaths. The programme was held in 20 LGAs across Lagos State,” Omoseyindemi said.
He added that his Board would continue to conduct further tranings for practitioners
“LSTMB and the state Ministry of Health organised training on Integrated Community Case Management (ICCM) of childhood illnesses for TBAs, Pharmaceutical Medicine Vendors (PMVs) and community pharmacists.
“The TBAs have been linked to chlorhexidine gel for cord care and as such training on antenatal, maternal and newborn care were done. They were all sensitised on the importance of referral,” Omoseyindemi added.