The Upper West Regional Hospital has not been provided with seed money and vehicles to operate since its inception in 2020. Officers of the facility had no option but to always travel by public transport to perform official duties outside the region. These notwithstanding, the management team of the hospital had been able to maintain all the machines and equipment provided and reduced electricity bills from 1.2 million cedis to 500,000 cedis per month through the provision of less energy consuming bulbs and air conditioners. Dr Robert Amesiya, the Medical Director of the hospital, made these known before the Upper West Regional Minister, Mr Stephen Yakubu during a working visit to interact with the management team and unit heads to learn of the challenges and problems. He announced that the authorities had planned to establish a Cancer Centre to add to its existing Dialysis Centre to provide efficient and effective healthcare services to reduce referral cases. The Medical Director, however, identified ch allenges in the area of specialists, saying, 'The hospital has not fulfilled number of specialists needed but relying mostly on visiting specialists to carry out special medical functions, and this is a hindrance.' Mr. Yakubu commended the management team, unit heads and the entire staff of the hospital for their passion and dedication to work while assuring that he would interact with the appropriate government officials and lobby others to help address some of their problems. He said he was impressed with the adequate equipment and machines installed at the hospital's laboratory but advised the workers that their dedication and efficient use of the equipment available was equally important to produce the best results. He encouraged the staff to put in more effort to serve and address health issues affecting the development and productivity of the people in the communities. Mr. Yakubu said the government was building five district hospitals in the region under the Agenda 111 Project and tasked the distri ct assemblies to sponsor students to medical schools to study medicine and other programmes to come out and work in those facilities after completion. He appealed to the Regional Directorate of the Ghana Health Services to also carry out research in the communities to find out why there were many people having kidney problems in recent times and embark on public education to help address the situation. Source: Ghana News Agency