Private medical practitioner, Dr. Adomako Kissi, has raised concerns over Ghana’s worsening hospital capacity crisis, warning that the country’s persistent “no bed syndrome” is contributing to preventable deaths.
According to the former Member of Parliament for Anyaa Sowutuom, in an opinion piece he authored, major urban centres including Ashiaman, Madina, Adenta, and Amasaman are facing severe shortages in hospital bed capacity, leaving key facilities overstretched.
He therefore proposed a minimum target of three beds per 1,000 people to ease the pressure on emergency services and improve access to healthcare—a figure that falls within the benchmark recommended by the World Health Organization, which advises between two and five hospital beds per 1,000 population for adequate acute care delivery
“Ashiaman, Madina, Dome Kwabenya, Adenta, Amasaman and Anyaa Sowutuom plus La need bed capacity that Ridge or Korle-Bu cannot handle at the moment. This means we need this ratio of 3 beds per 1000 people within Greater Accra, Ashanti Region, Central Region, Northern Region and Eastern Region where the population of people are greatest.,” he stated, stressing that existing referral facilities are already overwhelmed.
Dr. Kissi attributed the growing crisis to a combination of structural, financial and workforce challenges confronting the health sector.
“Ghana’s hospitals face serious challenges including significant specialized health care workforce shortages due to exist to European and American Hospitals, reduced National Health Insurance rates, shortfalls, increasing pressure from government and private payers to both improve quality and reduce costs, increasing pharmacy costs, continuing tight capital markets, new regulation of electronic transmissions of information and privacy restrictions, fragmented data systems reporting to multiple state agencies, growing numbers of uninsured patients seeking care, increased demand on emergency departments, a severe lack of capacity in the state’s mental health treatment system, increasing malpractice and other liability costs,” he said.
He further pointed to rising healthcare expenditure as an additional strain on the system.
“The government spends about 1, 478Gh per person on hospital care in Ghana and this amount has been rising each year,” he noted.
Beyond infrastructure and funding constraints, the medical practitioner emphasised that poor health-seeking behaviour among Ghanaians is significantly worsening pressure on emergency services.
“People who need to see their doctor early before crisis are part of the burden on emergency room. Many cases would not have become an emergency if the person had been seen earlier or sort care much earlier. Are people visiting the emergency room more than outpatient consultation and if so, why? Why wait till you have a severe hypertensive or diabetic issue before you visit hospital? Delayed pelvic scan for many pregnant women with ectopic pregnancy become major emergencies when determined late and many die on the way to emergency room. We must do more health promotion to reduce or prevent emergencies in the country; we need all stakeholders including religious men and women who advice patients to seek hospital care only when all efforts of prayers have failed or not worked,” he stressed.
Dr. Kissi also called for intensified public health education and preventive care measures to reduce avoidable emergencies and deaths.
“ All women who miss their menses must be advised to take a scan, all men and women above 25 years must be encouraged to have regular blood pressure checks etc. The need to wear helmets, seatbelt and to carefully look at speed limits, road warning signs must all be done to reduce accidents which become emergencies,” he advised.
He concluded that addressing Ghana’s hospital capacity challenges will require urgent, coordinated action, including expanding bed capacity, strengthening the health workforce, improving preventive care, and ensuring timely access to medical services to save lives.
