Kumasi, Aug. 27, GNA - Some foreign based Ghanaian doctors are thinking of re-locating to the country following completion of the National Accident and Emergency Centre as well as renovation and construction of additional facilities at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) in Kumasi.

Dr Anthony Nsiah Asare, Chief Executive Officer of the hospital, said the hospital had been collaborating with international medical institutions and establishments.

Its attractiveness has increased and this is helping the hospital to register some brain gain instead of brain drain. Addressing the mid-year performance review meeting of the hospital in Kumasi on Wednesday, Dr Nsiah Asare, said the Centre, with a mortuary attached, is expected to become operational by the end of September. He said completion of the mortuary had made it possible for the hospital to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with the USA based Pathologists Overseas (PO) volunteers, a global association of pathologists to improve pathology services and training at the hospital. The hospital will soon start a residency programme in pathology after accreditation from the Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons. In addition, Dr Nsiah Asare said the waiting time for pathological test results, which took several months because they were sent outside the country, could now be obtained in one week because of the availability of specialists.

He said as a result of the completion of the Emergency Centre, a group of Ghanaian specialists in the USA were constituting themselves into a faculty to start the training of emergency physicians and nurses at the Centre for the West African sub-region.

Additionally, discussions are also underway with a number of collaborators, including the University of Michigan, for the same purpose.

Dr Nsiah Asare thanked the government and all other stakeholders for the facilities and said they were accelerating the hospital's quest to become a medical centre of excellence in Africa. He said the hospital had also awarded on contract the construction of a 25 cubic-metre incinerator at the cost of 100,000 Ghana cedis to take care of both clinical and general solid waste at the hospital. The hospital, in collaboration with the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly, has also awarded a 62,000 Ghana cedis contract for the rehabilitation of the broken down sewerage system.

He commended the staff and workers of the hospital for their hard work and dedication, which had ensured the implementation of the hospital's strategic development which began in 2004.