Tuberculosis: SFH, Kano State Treats Over 20, 000 Patients

By Salihu Ali, Kano

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Over 20,000 patients suffering from Tuberculosis are currently enjoying treatment championed by Society for Family Health (SFH) in collaboration with Kano state Government.

 

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The lead, TB Watch Corporate and Philanthropy, Pharmacist Jane Adize revealed this at the SFH TB close-out meeting in Kano, Northwest Nigeria.

She explained that, those identified and placed on the treatment were mapped out from private clinics and hospitals across the state over the last five years.

She said, “the programme actually involved in active case finding for TB, so what we do is to work with community structures, focus in the private sector to sensitize, screen and then when there are presumptive we link them to care so that will be properly diagnosed.

Dr. Adize said, the programme seeks to follow up to see that all TB cases are detected and placed on treatment.

While commending the Kano state government for providing an enabling environment to implement the project, Dr. Adize called for more support to sustain the achievement for the state for the betterment of the lives of the people.

Also speaking, the Kano state commissioner for health, Dr Abubakar Yusuf represented by Dr. Ibrahim Gano said, the government in the last five years with the support of the USAID funded project with SFH supporting the state government in implementing it.

He added that, many private institutions have been reached out through the Private Health Institutions Agency (PHIMA) and were able to engage more community pharmacists, private clinics and hospitals who hitherto were not providing TB services.

He said, “With the engagement we had with them they have been able to provide key and basic TB services from screening to diagnosis to treatment care and referral and that’s a very great success in Kano State.

“We had over 20,000 patients under this project who we detected and placed on treatment within the last five years.” The Commissioner explained.

Society for Family Health (SFH) is one of Nigeria’s largest public health non-governmental organisations (NGOs), with four decades of experience in delivering public health services to the Nigerian populace.

The organisation has the mission to improve health outcomes by ensuring communities, particularly the poor and vulnerable have access to affordable quality health services to lead healthier lives.

SFH programmes focus on eight (8) health areas among them HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment, Family planning and reproductive health, Malaria, Prevention and treatment of diarrheal diseases, Maternal and child healthcare, Water hygiene and sanitation, Non-communicable diseases, and Tuberculosis prevention and treatment.

 

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