-LMDA puts smiles on faces by conducting surgeries, donating gifts & building capacities
By David S. Menjor and Alfred Kollie,ALFREDKOLLIEJR92@gmail.com
Bong County-Over 500 patients in central Liberia, Bong County have benefited from one-day free medical outreach from the Liberia Medical and Dental Association (LMDA).
It is first face of the 2019 medical outreach program the LMDA has instituted in an effort to help less fortunate people have access to quality healthcare with no cost attached.
The outreach was launched in the county last Friday (March 29, 2019), targeting two major health facilities–the Phebe and CB Dunbar Hospitals.
The President of the LMDA, Dr. Emmanuel K. Ekyeinabah led an array of several medical professionals, including surgeons, ophthalmologists and dentists to the Phebe and C.H. Dumbar Hospitals in and near Gbarnga, the capital of Bong County and with diligent commitment to sacrificial service they attended to over two hundred patients.
LMDA’s Secretary-General Dr. Yuah A. Nemah told reporters this week that the free medical services in Bong County were performed by 30 doctors who are members of the LMDA.
“These doctors provided medical cares to patients with complicated cases in specified medical areas while others were tested and referred for treatments,” Dr. Nemah said.
According to Dr. Nemah, 150 of the over 500 patients went through free Eye Test and were subsequently educated on which types of glasses to use, where others were referred for treatments.
He further noted that patients who went through eye Treatments at the Suakoko Market were given free medicines and eyeglasses by the LMDA.
In addition, Dr. Nemah asserted that the LMDA provided free Dental treatment for over 20 patients as well as performed general surgery for 30 persons at the Phebe Hospital in Bong County.
“We at the same time provided other medical services and treatments for 50 persons with diverse medical complications at and PED for 39 persons at the Phebe and CB Dunbar Hospitals,” Nemah averred.
Nemah maintained that the LMDA team of doctors performed Laboratory Tests for several patients at the CB Dunbar Hospital while surgeries were performed on 12 women with severe medical complications at the same hospital.
He said the LMDA concluded its outreach in Bong County with health education and mental health education at three different sites.
Dr. Nemah named the sites as Phebe Community Lutheran School, St. Martin Catholic High School, and the Gbarnga Central Market.
The LMDA Secretary General Nemah in the meantime said the medical outreach is in support of government Pro-poor Agenda for Prosperity and Development aimed at providing quality health services for Liberians.
The provision of medical services according to him is part of the LMDA strategy to embark on a quarterly medical outreach in rural Liberia to help improve healthcare delivery system there.
Dr. Nemah believes it is important for the LMDA to move into hard-to-reach areas and offer medical service to those who have limited access to medical facilities.
“We intend to have quarterly medical outreach; the LMDA aims to ensure that people, especially those living in the isolated or rural parts of the country and people who have very limited access to medical care in Liberia receive the needed medical care and supports in rural areas as well as establishing the necessary mechanism by which collaborations for the regular supply of supplementary services will be established,” Dr. Nemah said.
According to him, the medical outreach will help those providing medical services in rural Liberia to establish the necessary mechanism for supplementary services.
Meanwhile, Dr. Nemah said the LMDA outreach will not only focus on medical services but the transfer of new and updated medical knowledge and skills to medical practitioners working in rural areas.
He reiterated that some healthcare practitioners in rural Liberia lack updated medical exposure to treatment of new cases and as such, the outreach will keep them informed.
“It is very essential that healthcare professionals receive new and updated medical exposure to treat new cases. These are skills which those professionals in these rural areas in Liberia do not have and it is our plan to impact those new skills to them,’’ Dr. Nemah averred.
The Liberia Medical and Dental Association (LMDA) is the national representative body of all doctors and dentists practicing in Liberia, whose aim is to promote and maintain high standards of professional practice, ethics, dignity and morals of medical doctors and dentist; to promote research and improvements in the health care delivery system; and to be an agency for the dissemination and advise on all health matters in Liberia.
The head of the Bong County health team, Dr. Adolphus T. Yeiah who welcomed Dr. Ekyeinabah and his delegation with warm affection on in the early morning of Friday March 29, 2019 said he was so pleased that LMDA considered Bong first on list of counties in for its medical outreach in 2019.
“Although we live in a third world country where access to almost the best of every good service, including health is a serious challenge, we are all confident in our willingness to serve our people. We are all not strangers to our country’s challenges,” Dr. Yeiah said.
He added that amid all the challenges, Liberians can still boast of having people with hearts and hands to help people in need in several ways.
“We are all aware that our calling is a very challenging one, mainly in the midst of the lack of the necessary resources and support but we can write a new history in which people will take pride at all times,” he said.
Dr. Kour Elma Geah welcoming the LMDA team from Monrovia to the C. B. Dumbar Hospital said the people of Bong are grateful for the free medical services rendered by the LMDA team to them.
“We are happy that you have selected Bong for the first of your nationwide medical and humanitarian outreach program for the year 2019. It is our prayer God places His healing upon our patients as we try humanly possible to provide them medical care,” Dr. Geah said.
In addition to surgical operations and other medical care services carried out during the first outreach program, the LMDA gave to patients, mainly children, play toys, including teddy bears and note books and clothes at both the Phebe Hospital and the C.B. Dumbar Hospital.
They also distributed drugs and wheel chairs for few of the disable persons in Phebe and Gbarnga.
One of the beneficiaries of the LMDA wheel chairs distribution, Mr. Dee Z. Jones said he was short of words to express his joy for gesture from the LMDA.
“I never expected this today. I came here to do a check up on my tooth which has been aching me for weeks now,” Jones who received one of the wheel chairs said as he appreciated the LMDA.
The Association’s March 28-30 medical outreach program was the first of several of its three month’s or quarterly outreach mission to hospitals and healthcare centers across the country where many less fortunate people can be provided the opportunity to free of charge medical treatment.
At the close of the 2019 first outreach mission on March 30, a special capacity building session was held with all the doctors and physicians present and more experienced and long serving doctors, as well as medical scholars from Nigeria, India and Liberia share with the new class of doctors lots of rich learning.