A section of Busia County residents have lauded president Dr William Samoei Ruto ‘s move to expand Busia County Referral Hospital to fully offer level 5 services cutting the cost of getting affordable medical services.
The president during his visit to Busia over the weekend noted that the facility will acquire medical specialists to operationalise Management Equipment Service (MES) such as Intensive Care Unit (ICU) Dialysis and X-ray machines to improve medical services at the facility.
This was after the president commissioned the 96-bed capacity surgical Ward constructed by the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) at a cost of Sh 100 million following a partnership between the National and County Governments of Busia.
Addressing Busia residents immediately after commissioning the Male Surgical Ward at the Busia County Referral Hospital, President Ruto stated that the move would reduce the burden of transporting the patients to Kisumu or Eldoret to seek specialised medical services.
“We brought equipment in this hospital but they have been lying idle for the last six years because of a lack of specialists, therefore I have instructed my Cabinet Secretary for Health, Dr. Susan Nakhumicha to get specialists so that they can operationalize the equipment such as Intensive Care Unit (ICU), Dialysis and X-ray machines to offer medical services to the residents of Busia,” said Dr.Ruto.
The facility alone has increased the bed capacity at the referral hospital from 200 to 296.
Busia Governor, Dr Paul Otuoma pointed out that the hospital is still experiencing some operational gaps that will require concerted efforts to address to attain full level five hospital status
“We want to improve the infrastructure and equipment of our Busia Referral Hospital for it to attain the full level five status facility through operationalisation of the dialysis and Intensive Care Unit (ICU) to offer quality medical services,” said Dr Otuoma.
The country boss reiterated his commitment to collaborate with the National Government on key priority areas to spur economic development.
Busia County has been in the spotlight in recent days for poor health services, something that hampered the county’s ability to collect revenue through NHIF as most cases had to be referred to neighboring counties.
By Absalom Namwalo
