“We are launching a health drive to change the hospital going attitude of Cameroonians”

–Dr Tasang Andrew, Atlantic Medical Foundation, Tiko

Dr. Tasang Andrew

You are carrying out a health drive programme in which you have brought in some experts. For this to have any effect, you have to change the general Cameroonian’s hospital going attitude.

Cameroonians need to change their hospital going attitude. We are launching this programme to change their hospital going attitude. It is indeed an uphill task. Cameroonians are known to neglect their health. It is however true that we black Africans in general suffer from this weakness. The notion of preventive medicine does not exist to us. In Europe, life expectancy is longer simply because they do regular medical checkups unlike us. We wait until it is too late when they are carrying us on the stretcher. In most cases, we just come to the hospital to die. I think we should change our pattern of life and the way we perceive things. We give preference to unimportant things like buying bottles of beer at the expense of saving for health needs. When you prescribe drugs for amounts as small as 2000 FCFA, they say it is much and end up not buying prescribed drugs. 

What aspects of health problems is your programme going to touch?

They say charity begins at home so let me start with the fact that me as an Obstetrician Gynecologist is going to participate in this health drive programme focusing on this aspects of health. We have a lot of things to do in Gynecology. The most recurrent is infertility. There are a lot of infertile couples. There are some who have had a child or two and then suddenly stopped giving birth to children. To solve this problem we will have to look at the issue of Sexually Transmitted Diseases. You know that now there is a lot of irresponsible sexual activity enhanced by changing habits of the younger generations. Their ways are not like ours since we grew up in a very reserved manner. We will also take care of all diseases concerning women though for now I can only mention a few. It is equally true that many of the young people suffering from sexual weakness only need psychotherapy but in some cases there could be a background of infection. It is not normal that a young man should have sexual weakness and for a woman to have frigidity. 

We equally understand that you are bringing in some dermatologists among other specialists. 

In the villages we have a lot of diseases ranging from rashes to cancer so we have a dermatologist here to take care of things. At times you have some rashes that do not respond to medication so there is a doctor who is a specialist in skin diseases. That’s what we refer to as a dermatologist. Albinos for example need a lot of skin care so he is there for that. 

Cosmetologists consist part of your health drive team. Who is a cosmetologist?

He is one whose business is to render the skin beautiful. They enhance the natural beauty of the skin. Many women have the habit of using skin bleaching agents. This is terrible. Your natural color is the best and changing your skin color exposes you to a lot of diseases amongst which are cancer.

So what will be the role of the medical biologist?

Medicine without the laboratory is nothing because once you have the presumptive diagnoses, that’s when you see somebody and you believe it could be this, you send for the laboratory to confirm. So the specialist we have here is somebody with a PhD in Biological Sciences. We do all the advance tests and get the precise diagnoses because with this treatment is halfway gone.

You equally talked about the visiting Ear Nose and Throat specialist who is part of your health drive.

We have so many diseases concerning the ear mouth and throat. There are people who have difficulties in breathing always feeling congested especially when it is cold. This specialist will also take care of those having hearing problems. This is another rare specialty and in the South West Region, this is the only place where you have an ear, nose and throat specialist. The one we have here comes from L’Hopital General the reference hospital in Douala to come and consult here.

Do you have a message for the needy Tiko and Cameroonian population? 

  

Certainly. The only message I have for them is to know that prevention is better than cure. If people prevent diseases, about 90% of diseases we suffer from will not be there. 

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