There is no doubt that the Medical Laboratory Science Profession and the respective medical laboratory facilities in Ghana have numerous challenges. Professionals before and after 1973 have had several counts of demands to improve quality medical laboratory service delivery in Ghana. In fact the current structure and wording used for Part 1 of the ACT 857 if not same is similar to the very first draft for a regulator for Medical Laboratory Technology in Ghana in 1973.
The challenges cut across medical laboratory management, human resource, financing, logistics and consumables shortages, infrastructure and many others. These became clear and revealed with evidence in a national survey carried out by the Ghana Health Services with enormous support from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, Atlanta) in 2009.
A solution for the uncoordinated nature of medical laboratories in Ghana due to the lack of a directorate with director and frequent shortages of consumables for medical laboratory testing due to shortage of funds dedicated to re-tooling the laboratories, has not been implemented because some medical doctors trained by the Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons (GCPS) have decided to lord over professionals of medical laboratory science in Ghana.
The standards set by Ghana Standards Authority (GSA), GS ISO 15189:2017) demands a director with competence for Medical Laboratory Services and this should not be compromised because of an alien program forced on Ghanaians by the GCPS.
From the course and curriculum of the GCPS (a page captured in picture), Laboratory Medicine Practitioners are needed in Ghana and plan to train about 250 for the health facilities in Ghana. One wonders what at all they are trained to do that autonomous medical laboratory professionals could not do since their course content is a virtual copy and paste without reality. I would not have been bothered if that was even legal in the context of the interpretation of ACT 857, PART 2, Section 50.
The Law gives out the illegality
The Health Professions Regulatory Bodies ACT, 2013 (ACT 857) sets regulations for Allied Health Professionals in PART 1, Medical Doctors in PART 2, Nurses and Midwives in PART 3, Pharmacists in PART 4 and Psychologists in PART 5. Under Section 50 of ACT 857, PART 2, the Interpretation of “medicine” includes surgery, anaesthesia, obstetrics and gynaecology, paediatrics, psychiatry, public health, internal medicine, radiology and radiotherapy.
In that tall list of areas within medicine that the law enjoins one to practice under the regulations of the Medical and Dental Council, there was no mention of LABORATORY PHYSICIAN. It is foreign and alien and ILLEGAL to force it in my view. Especially in an area where professionals have been developed to be autonomous even by law. Anyone who wants to practice as such commits an offense by making false declaration in my view under Section 48 where Offenses are described.
It is rather prudent to pave way for the professionals in that area to develop to benefit the nation than to create illegal professional niches.
Why should Ghanaians suffer then?
The Minister of Health is on record to have said that the request of Medical Laboratory Scientist to be independent and manage their own affairs cannot be possible due to Laboratory Physicians trained by the GCPS. A law by the GSA cannot be implemented because GCPS say it should not since they have created Laboratory Physicians not recognized by law. I cannot imagine why an illegality in my view could be supported by those who are to protect Ghanaians from same. Is it the case of when it involves super powers, we could relax the laws? What is backing the creation of jobs for Laboratory Physicians?
When objectivity is lost to professional gains!
In the communique of Ghana Medical Association (GMA) from their annual meeting in Ho held from October 4 to 9, 2016, a concern was captured in a web publication (Publication on communique by GMA, Publication on GMA website) as below;
“Intra-facility relationship: The Association has also called for the immediate resolution of roles impasse between Laboratory Physicians and Biomedical Scientists in the various facilities by ensuring that the National Laboratory Policy is fair to all parties.”
In fact, the main communique made mentioned that they are likely to descend on government if the issues are not resolved.
From the figure shown, the GCPS indicates that the policy document been referred to by the GMA should be implemented only when it is revised to state that medical laboratories can only be managed by “Laboratory Physicians who are registered with the Ghana Medical and Dental Council (GMDC)”. Is that what they call fairness and want to support? Is it because they are able to “shut down a whole health system and could descend on the government for their demands to be met”, every illegal demand should be met?
My understanding and conclusion!
I am of the view that, Ghanaians should not be made to suffer because a College has created an alien nomenclature and want to force it down on the government and other professionals. As far as the laws are concerned, LABORATORY PHYSICIAN IS ALIEN and the truth must be told as such.
Ghanaians deserve better health care delivery systems especially Medical Laboratory Services and we should let the laws and common sense work. Always bent on giving the demands of medical doctors from the GCPS would plunge the country into a bottomless pit of destruction.
I call on all well-meaning Ghanaians to speak up and let the practice of Medical Laboratory Science be maintained as autonomous as the laws have made it now.