The Adeoyo Hospital in Ibadan has dicharged patients on admission following the nationwide strike embarked on by the National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives (NANNM), which began on Wednesday.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the association directed its members to start a seven-day warning strike following the Federal Government’s failure to respond to their demands.
Some of the demands of the nurses are the upward review of shift allowance, uniform allowance adjustment, a separate salary structure for nurses, increased core duty allowance.
Also included in the demands are mass employment of nurses, and the establishment of a nursing department in the Federal Ministry of Health among others.
A visit by a NAN Correspondent to Adeoyo State Hospital, Ring Road, Ibadan, showed that many of the wards had no patients on admission at the hospital.
NAN was informed that the patients were discharged with just few in critical condition still on the wards, but with no nurses to attend to them.
A relative of one of the patients at the female ward, Mr Adegoke Rahman, said some of the patients in the ward were told to go home due to the nurses’ strike.
Rahman said that his mother, who was still at the hospital ward, just had an operation on her leg and could not walk or use it to stand.
He said that doctors were the ones attending to them and no nurse was presently working at the hospital.
Also, Mr Samuel Biyi, an out patient, said that he came to the hospital to treat a wound on his leg and was not attended to.
He said that the leg was seriously paining him.
One of the doctors on duty, who pleaded that his name shouldn’t be published, said that doctors and other medical personnel were not on strike and were attending to patients.
He, however, said that the hospital was not currently taking patients on admission, but attending to out patients.
The doctor said that any patient with critical condition not admitted were referred to private hospitals for treatment.
He said that the patients on admission had been told to go home since yesterday because of the nurses’ strike.
It would be recalled that the National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives (NANNM), Oyo State chapter, dieected its members to comply with the seven- day nationwide warning strike starting from Wednesday.
The Oyo State NANNM Secretary, Comrade Emmanuel Aina, made this known in a statement on Tuesday.
Aina said the decision arose from the resolution of the emergency meeting of the National Executive Council of NANNM and subsequent directive received from NANNM National Headquarters. (NAN)
