Remote consulting is a game changer for expanding routine healthcare to Nigerian patients with non-communicable diseases like hypertension, particularly in the hard-to-reach communities in Nigeria.
Lead investigator of the REmote Consulting in Primary Healthcare (REaCH) Trial in Nigeria, Professor Akinyinka Omigbodun, speaking at the stakeholders’ meeting and upscale of REaCH Health Worker Training in Nigeria and Ghana, said upscaling remote consulting to all healthcare facilities will be a significant step towards Nigeria achieving universal health coverage.
The training is part of the Global Health Workforce Programme large grant sponsored by the United Kingdom Global Health Partnerships (formerly THET).
According to Professor Omigbodun, patients in specified conditions can receive healthcare services via remote consultations without physically visiting the medical facility, worrying about their safety or its effectiveness in primary care consultations for chronic conditions like hypertension.
He said results of the REaCH trial showed that the training of health workers on remote consulting led to an increase in the use of remote consulting, and the health workers claim that it reduced the number of patients coming physically to the health facilities even though the patients still get the services that they need.
Omigbodun, a professor of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, added, “We didn’t find a reduction in workload. If anything, they were able to take care of more patients. It was safe, it was effective, the patients trusted it, and there was a lot of convenience for them.
And so it expanded the reach of the health workers. They could reach many more patients even within the same limited amount of time. The patients were very happy. And that’s why we’ve laid a lot of emphasis on pre-service training on remote consultations during this upscaling.
“So we are training student nurses, medical students, students of community health practitioners, and community health extension workers, so that by the time they join the health workforce, they are already aware of how to do this. And so they can integrate it into the work they do.”
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The REaCH trial lead for Kano State, Professor Ibrahim Yakasai, said remote consultation is apparently something people have been doing at the primary healthcare centres, focusing primarily on hypertension, diabetes, kidney disease, and family planning, although it was not coined or given a name.
He declared that remote consultation had also strengthened the referral system in the state, adding, “If they call and they think it’s an emergency, our primary health care staff have been trained to refer to designated hospitals. So with the coming of this programme, we now further escalate it.”
Professor Yakasai said remote consultation had further been strengthened through the REaCH trial in Kano State but called for increased community participation to ensure their understanding of remote consultation and engender support for its increased adoption to provide healthcare services.
According to him, a budget line has also been planned in Kano State to ensure funding for phones, SIM cards, and airtime for all primary health care centres to sustain the provision of remote consultations.
Earlier, Executive Secretary, Oyo State Primary Healthcare Board, Dr. Muideen Olatunji, represented by Dr. Sunday Adewole, in a reaction, urged that the project in its second phase will be extended to more primary healthcare facilities across the state to ensure remote consulting for the chronic disease population in Oyo State.
Professor Funke Fayehun, in an overview of REaCH 2, said its goal was to train the primary healthcare workforce and pre-service healthcare trainees on remote consultation using the REaCH training platform and to integrate it into continuous professional development (CPD) and pre-service training curricula to advance universal health coverage.
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