NARD Demands CMDs’ Sanction Over Attacks On Workers
The Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors has said that the Chief Medical Director or Medical Director of any hospital in the country where a doctor or health worker is attacked by patients’ relatives during the line of duty should be queried.
Decrying the spate of attacks on medical professionals in recent times, NARD said it was the responsibility of the CMDs and the medical directors of hospitals to provide security to their staff.
The National President of NARD, Dr. Emeka Orji, stated this while speaking with newsmen.
Orji who is also a Senior Registrar at the Department of Orthopaedics and Trauma Surgery, Federal Medical Centre Umuahia, Abia State, lamented that hospitals in the country are not secure.
Orji said issuing a query would serve as a deterrent to the CMDs and the medical directors who are neglecting the security of their staff.
According to him, security should not be compromised in hotspots in the hospital, particularly in the emergency department and general outpatient department where most of the attacks take place.
He said, “There has to be a systematic arrangement on how to secure the hospitals. Hospital management is representing the government, they are the people in charge of the hospitals. They should be able to control the situation.
“But if the government at the federal or centre is getting this report, they must interrogate their officers who are heading those institutions to find out why they will be having these regular attacks in those hospitals.
“There should be a policy that in any hospital where a doctor or any health worker is attacked, the chief medical director or medical director of the hospital should be queried because it is your responsibility to protect your staff.
“This is not just even about the hospital, it is just that it is happening in the hospital. In any establishment where you have staff, it is the responsibility of the chief executive officer to protect the staff and if you are not able to do that, you should be held responsible for it.
“We believe that it is when these people are being held to account that they will try to improve on these areas that we are talking about.”
The NARD president stressed that the CMDs and medical directors have a responsibility to provide a visible security presence in the hospitals.
Giving sight into the lack of security in hospitals in the country, the physician said, “Usually, when you hear of an attack in the hospital, it is either in the emergency department or in the general outpatient department.
“It is only once in a while that you see them happening in the inpatient ward. The hospitals are not secure. Many of them are just thoroughfare, there is no restriction.
