Some women at Buli, a community in the Wa West District have indicated that inadequate delivery beds at the Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) facility in the community is a bane to their access to skilled delivery services.

They added that the poor state of the delivery room at the facility also discouraged them from accessing delivery services.

One other challenge they identified was the unavailability of health personnel at the facility, especially during the weekends, which had been a source of worry for them.

Mary Saako, a resident, said those situations compelled them to resort to the Lassie Health Centre in the district for skilled delivery and other healthcare services.

The women raised the concerns during a community to assess the state of service delivery from the facility as well as to discuss ways of improving service delivery.

“It is only one delivery bed at the CHPS. So, when a woman delivers there, they asked her to go home, even if she is not due for discharge, to create room for another person to deliver.

“Sometimes, when a woman is in labour and goes to the CHPS, the nurse (Midwife) will not be there so, we go to the Lassia (Health Centre) to deliver,” she added and cited an instance when a woman delivered at home due to the absence of the midwife at the CHPS.

The women appealed to the health directorate to consider upgrading the facility to a health centre to help improve the quality of service delivery at the facility.

Moses Kyetong, the Assembly Member of the Buli Electoral Area, told that Ghana News Agency (GNA) in an interview that Buli was about 9km away from Lassia and the road was also in a very deplorable state.

He said pregnant women sometimes trekked or were transported on motorbikes or tricycles to the Lassia Health Centre to access skilled delivery services.

Meanwhile, Jonas Kpokpori, who represented the Wa West District Health Director, lamented the low attendance at the facility and urged the residents to make good use of it.

“If the attendance increases, they can upgrade it, bring some key staff and medicines to the facility to improve on the quality of the service delivered to you,” he added.

Daniel Erinue Dortiery, a Community Health Nurse at the Buli CHPS, explained that the facility was rendering some services to the communities including delivery, antenatal, and outreach services, among others.

He corroborated the concerns of the women of the inadequate beds at the facility, the deplorable state of the delivery room, and the lack of streetlights at the facility, which were impeding quality service delivery.

He appealed to the necessary stakeholders including the District Assembly and the health directorate, the Member of Parliament for the area, and benevolent individuals and organisations to help ameliorate the myriad problems facing the facility.

Over 2,000 people in Buli and the surrounding community depended on that health facility for healthcare services.