VRA commissions 2 mammogram machines
The Volta River Authority (VRA) has commissioned two modern mammogram machines for its hospitals to improve and expand access to breast screening services.
One of the machines has been installed at VRA Hospital in Akosombo with the other at its hospital in Accra.
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The power generator procured the machines which cost GH¢3.6 million at the request of the VRA Ladies Association.
Each machine can serve the needs of about a million women in the catchment area in a year, according to health experts.
At a ceremony at the Akosombo Hospital last Wednesday to symbolically commission both machines, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the VRA, Emmanuel Antwi-Darkwa, said the procurement was in line with the authority’s priority on the health of female workers of VRA and to also encourage the VRA Ladies Association to continue to positively influence society and bring the needed change to the communities.
Mr Antwi-Darkwa lauded and congratulated the VRA Ladies Association on the initiative, which would justifiably save the lives of many women in general.
He said random clinical trials and other studies showed that using the mammogram to screen women would ensure early detection and by extension early treatment, which would reduce fatalities, adding “it is sad to lose women due to treatable conditions such as breast cancer’’.
The ceremony, which attracted women from other organisations from the Asuogyaman District, and the traditional rulers from the Akwamu Traditional area, was on the theme “Early detection of breast cancer saves lives, get screened with mammogram’’.
The Eastern Regional Director of Health Services, Dr Winnifred Ofosu; the Chairperson of the VRA Board, Joyce Rosalind Aryee; the Director of VRA Hospitals, Dr Omari Yeboah, among other directors of VRA, graced the occasion.
Superstition
The CEO cautioned women to clear their minds of any anxiety or fear which kept them away from the authority’s annual breast screening exercise.
He said it was unfortunate that some people were so heavily driven by superstition that they attributed medical conditions such as breast cancer to spiritual attacks and, therefore, did not seek medical help.
“Let this not be the lot of our VRA women. We need all hands on deck to educate our daughters, wives, sisters and female friends to take advantage of the facility to know their status,” Mr Antwi-Darkwa emphasised.
The National President of the VRA Ladies Association, Stella Mawushi Dey, on behalf of the association, expressed profound gratitude to the management of VRA for heeding the call to save women from such a dreadful disease.
Access to mammogram
She said the association over the years had expressed grave concern about great challenges they went through in accessing mammogram services.
Ms Dey said their continuous call for the machine led them to launch a fund-raising campaign during the association’s 20th anniversary to purchase at least a mammogram machine, which the authority wholeheartedly paid for without the association making any financial commitments towards it.
The Medical Superintendent of the VRA Hospital, Dr Charles Arhinful, said the authority had, since 2016, collaborated with Koforidua Central Hospital and the Okomfo Anokye Teaching Hospital in Kumasi in managing breast cancer cases at a huge cost to both the hospital and the patients.
He said with the acquisition of the mammogram machine for the hospital, patients who patronised the facility would no longer travel long distances for basic mammogram tests.
The Chief of Akosombo, Nana Boafo Ansah Prem IV, who chaired the programme, appealed to the clergy to allow women in their churches who suffered from breast cancer disease to go for the tests instead of seizing them for only prayers.