By Joseph Abiria

Arua

A section of residents from arua district have challenged the leadership of the district to come up with tangible strategies that could help in addressing the health situation and fixing the existing gaps.

The residents identified under staffing as a key factor that is facing health facilities. During a dialogue organized by Radio Pacis in partnership with DW Akademie over the weekend, it was discovered that most of the lower health facilities do not have adequate staff to facilitate smooth operation of the health departments and therefore persons with disabilities are at cross roads in accessing health care services.

Jane Candiru, a visually impaired resident of Logiri Sub County gives an account of what disabled mothers go through during the processes of delivering. “Then we have absence of delivery beds for disabled mothers, of course when you your physically disabled, you will not be in a position to use these beds which are high like this, but in Logiri H/C III we don’t have,” she said.

Due to inadequate staffing in health facilities, the population suffers the most and this has increased cases of self-medication because people end up seeking for medical attention from drug out lets, Demos Pariyo a veterinary officer in Ajia Sub County says that the current staffing level in health facilities is over whelming the district health status. “if you look at the population that we have in Ajia Sub County visa vie the number of staff that we have at the facility, I think it’s overwhelming, at times these staffs over work beyond their working hours, it’s because the numbers are not enough, the 17 staffs that he talked about, you realize that half of them work during day and half at night,” he emphasized.

But the District Health Officer of Arua Bishop Paul Drileba noted that there is no immediate plan of fixing the staffing gaps in the district because the line Ministry of Health has not issued the district with a new recruitment programme due to a limited resource envelope. “For now they have said that Arua District should not recruit because of the wage limitation, so we can’t do any miracle at the moment, when they give us a ago ahead, we shall recruit so we shall address the human resource issues as soon as we are given a go ahead with the available wage to be paid to the health workers”, he revealed.

Meanwhile the deputy Chief Administrative Officer of Arua District Walega John Bosco stressed that posting of health personnel’s to particular health centers vary from one health centre to another.  “Staffing depends on the type of health facilities, the staffing for H/CII is not the same for H/CIII and cannot be the same as H/C IV. I should use this opportunity again to thank the government of Uganda because they are soon recruiting medical doctors and superintendents at H/C III level”, he stressed further.

According to data Obtained from the health department of Arua District, staffing  norm in health facilities stands at 70%, which is  below the national coverage of 85% .

COVER PHOTO: Participants in a group photo after the dialogue By Joseph Abiria