By Chioma Umeha
Desperately in need of surgery to alleviate the
ravages of sickle cell disease and previous medical care that worsened his
condition, Abiodun Bakare a university student, was about to give up hope when
he discovered the cost of his surgery would be N18 million (about $50,000).
Bakare, his family and friends had done their
research and discovered that a hospital in India could provide him with the
care he needed, but the cost of the care and the journey was well beyond his
reach.
Digging deeper, Bakare was determined to solve his
challenge locally, and finally his search connected him with a hospital in
Nigeria’s northern state of Sokoto where medical experts agreed to perform the
operation for a nominal fee.
Bakare’s friends jumped in, launched a social media
fundraising campaign, and pulled together the money needed for the operation.
However, Bakare still had to overcome one huge hurdle: how to get to the
hospital.
The 18-hour overland journey was out of the
question due to Bakare’s critical condition. Fortunately, a friend stepped in
again and discovered a solution: Flying Doctors Nigeria, which agreed to fly
Bakare to the hospital free of charge. The offer reduced a journey that would
have taken longer than a day, to just over an hour.
“I knew we had to support Bakare with air
ambulance services because it would have been impossible for the student to
pull together the funds to pay for the service,” explained Dr. Ola Brown,
founder of Flying Doctors Nigeria, West Africa’s first and leading indigenous
air ambulance service organisation.
The news came as a surprise to Bakare. “I didn’t
even know there was an air ambulance service in Nigeria. I thought these
services exist only in the Western world. My health condition opened my eyes to
the fact that this kind of service is available in Nigeria,” Bakare later said.
He appreciates the support of Flying Doctors
Nigeria and understands its value. “This is a journey that the firm could
charge over a million naira for. It is still like a dream to me that this
kind-hearted firm would intervene in my situation and provide their air
ambulance services at no cost to me,” he added.
Dr. Ola Brown says that there are a number of reasons
air ambulance services are essential to both the patient in particular and the
healthcare community in general.
“The first hours of an emergency situation are
critical and the life of individuals shouldn’t depend on how far they live from
the medical facility best equipped to handle their injury or illness,” she
said. “And we know that the sooner patients receive the proper care, the sooner
and better they recover,” she added.
“Further, a firm like Flying Doctors Nigeria helps
us solve the logistical problems involved in providing good healthcare in
Nigeria, where the roads are often poor and the distances between the patient
and healthcare are wide,” she explained. “Ultimately, this allows us to save
money by centralising healthcare services.”
Bakare remains grateful. “I want to say thank you
to Flying Doctors Nigeria for their support, and encourage other Nigerians to
embrace this means of transporting critically ill patients, because if not for
Flying Doctors Nigeria, I could have remained in my serious and painful medical
condition.”
Dr Ola Brown established Flying Doctors Nigeria
almost 10 years ago. Since then, the firm has saved lives across the West
Africa sub-region, including infants, children, and pregnant women. Corporate
organisations, such as those in the construction, mining, oil & gas
industries, have also come to depend on the services of Flying Doctors Nigeria.
Born, raised and trained in the UK, Dr Ola Brown
graduated as one of the youngest medical doctors in England. She is also a
trainee helicopter pilot. She leads a team of 50 emergency healthcare
professionals from the Flying Doctors Nigeria base at Murtala Mohammed Airport
Lagos where their aircraft is located.
