The essence of Family Physicians within the Ghanaian health set-up has been brought to the fore by a medical practitioner at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital.

Dr. Fred Bedzrah; a family Physician tells rawgist.com though Ghana is still a long stretch from efficiently inculcating the phenomenon of Family Doctors in our health system, the capitation system introduced by the National Health Insurance Scheme is a good start.

Dr. Fred Bedzrah tells rawgist.com Family Physicians are essential to every medical system the world over and emphasizes the need for Ghana to take more targeted efforts in that regard. “Elsewhere, without a family physician, you cannot see any other doctor. It’s a specialist area, but we go through every department. We do surgeries, we take care of kids and every other thing as far as medical practice goes”.

“Family Physicians are the first point of care, and your care goes from childhood till old age. A family doctor involves the entire family. If someone comes with a headache, you don’t just look at the headache, but you look at it in the contest of the family, his work and his community as a whole”, he explained and added that Family Doctors also help keep accurate and up-to-date records on clients.

He cautioned smokers to quit since there is an upsurge in smoke-related cancers and added his voice to the need to ban tobacco products altogether. He revealed that people start smoking as early as 13 years old, and parents are helpless because “they don’t smoke at home.”

“It doesn’t matter if you stopped smoking ten years ago but once you have smoked before, you carry a lifetime risk of developing cancers,” he explained.