Tema-Ghana, May 5, CDA Consult – Medical Officers and Nurses suffer greatly after the death of a patient.
“Most doctors and nurses develop some sort of friendship with their patients, so when the person dies, it affects you physically, mentally, and emotionally for a brief moment; however, the next patient is waiting for treatment,” Dr. Barbara Ayesha Anawana Karbo, Accident and Emergency Specialists has stated.
She explained that, therefore, medical practitioners’ seeming numbness to a patient’s death is a coping mechanism to avoid carrying the weight of the death and endangering the care of other patients at the hospital.
Dr. Karbo, who is the Head of the Accident and Emergency Department at the International Maritime Hospital (IMaH), stated at the weekly “Your Health! Our Collective Responsibility,” a Ghana News Agency Tema Regional Office initiative aimed at promoting health-related communication and providing a platform for health information dissemination in order to influence personal health choices through improved health literacy.
The Tema Regional Office of the Ghana News Agency created the public health advocacy platform “Your Health! Our Collective Responsibility” to research the aspects of four health communication approaches: informing, instructing, persuading, and urging.
Dr. Karbo noted that, just as the general populace was brainwashed with various religious systems not to damage any soul, doctors and nurses were not exempt from such beliefs and were thus touched by the deaths of their hospitalised patients.
She stated that the most difficult thing she had to do as a doctor was to write the death certificate of a recently deceased patient.
She added that, from the outside, it appeared weak-hearted to appear unconcerned when someone died, which was reasonable, but was a coping strategy for doctors and nurses to avoid endangering anyone else.
She went on to say that when a doctor is burdened by the pain of earlier deaths, they tend to doubt their diagnosis and ability. When attending to the next patient in that state of mind, being thoughtful and fearful of applying the same diagnosis that led to the previous death will result in more fatalities.
Dr. Karbo also mentioned that, at the start of every medical officer’s career, watching a person die horrified them, and that they sometimes needed to take days off to recover from the shock of the death.
She added that doctors sometimes seek treatment to avoid appearing uncaring, despite the fact that their jobs forced them to grow numb due to their exposure to too many fatalities.
The IMaH Accident and Emergency Specialist urged the public not to dehumanise doctors and nurses because they are human and are affected by the deaths of others, particularly children.
She mentioned instances of doctors committing suicide after failing to save a life.
According to Mr. Francis Ameyibor, Tema Regional Manager of Ghana News Agency, “”GNA-Tema Your Health! Our Collective Responsibility” is a public health advocacy platform meant to investigate the four health communication techniques: informing, teaching, persuading, and urging.
He stated that the GNA platform acts as an ideal communication channel for medical practitioners to educate the public about healthy practises and other general health concerns through the weekly health conversation forum.
According to Mr. Ameyibor, it also intends to develop active two-way media advocacy channels for healthcare practitioners to share promotional health information and propagate public health issues and health education.
He stated that health difficulties cannot be avoided and advocated concerted efforts to promote a healthy lifestyle.
Mr. Ameyibor underlined the importance of collective accountability in maintaining a healthy lifestyle, saying, “You must be the first person to protect your health; let us be aware of issues that may endanger our lives, work, and people around us.”
