The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) has solicited the entrenchment and domestication of the Patients’ Bill of Right (PBoR) by state governments, as well as concerned healthcare providers, in their various healthcare families.
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The commission made the call at a training for healthcare providers on the importance of the PBoR, saying such would serve as a measure to increase consumers’ confidence in the healthcare services they receive, as well as guarantee an improved consumer relationship and cooperation.
The training, organised by Ace, a Non-Governmental Organisation, in collaboration with FCCPC had caregivers, the media, and different stakeholders in the healthcare sector, brainstorming on the importance of the PBoR and the inevitable need to domesticate it in various health facilities, even before it becomes an Act.
Fielding questions from journalists at the event, the Technical Assistant to the Executive Vice Chairman of the FCCPC, Mrs Morayo Adisa, said the training was facilitated to sensitise healthcare workers in the Southwest region on the PBoR because it is a document that collates all the rights of the patients under the Nigerian law and includes the responsibility of the patient as well as those of healthcare providers to their patients.
Adisa noted that the commission hoped that with the sensitisation programme, healthcare providers would domesticate the PBoR in their facilities in order to increase the confidence of patients in such facilities, explaining that although the National Health Act was passed in 2014, the FCCPC came up with the PBoR in 2018 to simplify the rights of patients and make it more accessible because it was not yet satisfied with the implementation of the Act.
She said, “Certainly, grassroots level engagement is very important because if the people don’t know their right, they won’t be able to assert or enforce it, or come to people like us to complain when such rights are being violated. Our strategy is to sensitise consumers at the grassroots level and also healthcare providers.
“Since we started this sensitisation path in 2018, over 20 healthcare facilities have domesticated the PBoR. That is, when you enter such facilities, you see at the entrance or reception, a bold signage which says these are the rights of the patients,” Adisa explained.
She observed that the confidence of patients in facilities that have domesticated the PBoR would be enriched, affirming that a facility that would declare patients’ rights would definitely be willing to go beyond declaring the rights to promoting, protecting and enforcing the rights.
Also speaking, the Chairman of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA), Oyo State, Dr Wale Lasisi, noted that with recent advancement in internet use, most people, patients and doctors inclusive, were being enlightened on their rights and there is the assurance that improvements would be experienced as regards the rights of patients and caregivers.
Similarly, the Chief Nursing Officer, St. Nicholas Hospital, Lagos, Mrs Bolanle Kolajo, said Nigerians were set to enjoy many benefits from the PBoR and called on stakeholders to tackle the issue of quackery in the medical industry.
Participants at the training expressed the hope that the stakeholders would walk the talk concerning the implementation of the PBoR, noting that such would go along way in protecting both patients’ and doctors’ rights.
The provisions of the PBoR includes: right to access information, right to confidentiality, right to consent to or refuse treatment, the right to quality care, right to emergency services, obligation of patients to pay their bills, etc.
