Original Research Article
Year: 2017 | Month: January | Volume: 7 | Issue: 1 | Pages: 218-226
Distribution of Health Facilities for Disaster Management and Emergency Response in Osun State, Nigeria
A. T. Salami, K. A. Adepoju, O. O. Ogundipe
Institute of Ecology and Environmental Science, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State.
Corresponding Author: O. O. Ogundipe
ABSTRACT
This work assessed health facilities for disaster management and emergency response in Osun State, Nigeria. This was with a view to developing a platform for sharing information among health institutions and the general populace in support of public health decision-making. A total of 300 health-related institutions including both government and private hospitals which were surveyed and selected on the basis of their capacity for performing basic emergency health services, were then contacted and surveyed for the study. A geospatial database was designed and implemented for 300 selected health institutions. The geographic location of selected health facility was registered with a Geographical positioning system (GPS) unit. Spatial and geostatistical analysis tools in ArcGIS were used for the assessment of disaster response capability of health facilities throughout the state in order to model the potential health disaster risk and their management. The findings revealed that there are more private health facilities 246 (82%) than the public health facilities 54 (18%) in this assessment and the distribution reveals that urban centres where high population is recorded have the larger share of the facilities. It also reveals that most of the health facilities are not prepared in response for emergency with the indicators used in this study, a total of 136 (45.3%) of the health facilities assessed have stretchers, 41 (13.7%) of the health facilities have ambulance, 18 (6%) of the health facilities have blood bank, 58 (19.3%) of the health facilities have scanner, 223 (74.3%) of the health facilities have 5 bed space or more and 19 (8.2%) are equipped with specialized services. 11 health facilities have all of the indicators in this study, 5 are public health facilities and 6 are private health facilities. The study concluded that rural inhabitant will be at disadvantage in case of serious emergency as they need to travel a long distance to get required health care.
Key words: Emergency, Management, Database, geospatial, Disaster, GPS, geostatistical, ArcGIS, Geospatial.