The Gbintir health centre in the North East Region has no single-sex ward for patients on admission at the facility.
The residents say that is a violation of their privacy and want the authorities to fix the problem.
Checks by Citi News indicate that men, women, and children are all put in the same ward during admission.
The Gbintir health centre is a popular facility taking care of the health needs of numerous communities within the Eastern corridor of Ghana.
It records a peak season during the rainy season where malaria and cholera top most health treated cases.
The centre however has only one detention room for all gender including children.
A client, Iddisah Ntowigwe from the Gbintir community said such a situation does not support their privacy and comfortability needs.
“There is no privacy here, and we are worried. I was admitted there once, and I felt uncomfortable throughout. What if it happens that a female wants to get up and her cloth falls from her waist and a man is looking at you? Or a man gets up, and his trousers fall in front of the woman. It is not good at all.”
Another client who visited for antenatal, Rahi Ibrahim said “If something can be done about the admission ward, we will be happy. Imagine lying in a room with a man that is not your husband or relative, you will be shy. We will like it if the authorities can come to our aid and make here like other places that have separate wards for patients.”
Standard practices by the Ghana Health Service require the separation of patients on admission by gender.
This means only same-sex patients should share admission wards, toilets, or bathrooms.
It is not clear whether other health facilities in the North East Region are facing similar challenges like the Gbintir health centre.
Iddrisu Weeboat brought his sick father to the health centre and witnessed the worrying situation. Iddrisu said the practice is a violation of patients’ dignity.
“Our worry is that men, women and children are all mixed here and that is not right.”
The Senior nursing officer at the Gbintir health centre, Seidu Yakubu is worried too. He said “We are faced with a lot of challenges but the most crippling among them is the inadequate beds in the facility per number of communities that we serve.”
Seidu Yakubu, the in-charge said, “in our peak season, that is the rainy season, we have many cases that require detention. It will marvel you to witness what happens here because we have a situation that is very dire.”
“Some clients will have to use the floor when the limited beds are full,” he said.
He in a Citi News interview said “We improvise a lot here and we are appealing to stakeholders and philanthropists to help add additional rooms to the existing one.”
The facility has no single vehicle for itself. The pickup truck for the centre has been marooned for nearly a decade. A donated tricycle by Catholic Relief Services—CRS has also been grounded.
