The Nkoranza Municipal Health Directorate recorded 29 Tuberculosis (TB) cases from January to June this year.
Mr. Francis Yaw Adjei, the Institutional TB Coordinator at the Nkoranza Saint Theresa’s Catholic Hospital, stated at a meeting, organised by the Health Directorate for 40 TB Control Programme Coordinators and TB affected persons in the Municipality on Thursday at Nkoranza.
The objective was to educate and encourage the patients on the need to seek for proper medical attention from hospitals to ensure effective management and cure of the disease for healthy living.
Mr. Adjei said 20 of the affected patients were males and nine were females, saying the Hospital had been visiting them to monitor the progress of their health, while counseling and encouraging them to lead healthy lives.
He mentioned Abuontam, Akumsa-Domase, Bonsu, Ahyiayem, Nkwabeng and Nkoranza Township as TB endemic areas in the Municipality.
Mr. Adjei commended Madam Georgina Saah, a ward Assistant at the Bonsu Health Centre, for her hard work, particularly, for her regular visit of TB affected persons in the community and the timely report on their conditions to the Hospital.
Madam Winifred Tienaah, the Municipal Director of Health, said gone were the days when TB was described as ‘ghost cough’ and ‘deadly’ disease, and advised the affected persons not to panic about their situation because there were prescribed medicines to cure the disease.
Madam Tienaah emphasised the need for the affected persons to rigorously follow the dosage of the medicines dispensed to them so as to complete the course.
She appealed to stakeholders like traditional rulers, Assembly-members, religious leaders, Unit Committees and Civil Society Organisations in the communities to join the campaign on TB Control by encouraging victims to attend the hospitals for medical care.
Later in an interview with the Ghana News Agency, Mr. Kwaku Effah, a TB affected person from Nkwabeng, expressed gratitude to the Ghana TB Control Programme for its educational activities in the communities.
Mr. Effah, a former ‘chain’ cigarette smoker, said for the past six months he had seen improvement in his health as a result of taking the course of the medication from the hospital.
He, therefore, reiterated the call to people suffering from the disease to report to the hospital for treatment and also advised the youth to shun smoking and alcoholism.
Source: GhanaWeb
