Gulu regional referral hospital has not had a stable and functioning x-ray machine for the last four years, the hospital’s medical director, Dr Nathan Onyachi told Acholi Times in an interview on Wednesday.
Dr Onyachi revealed that the only x-ray machine at the hospital has been on and off due to the overwhelming number of patients.
In 2006, according to Dr Onyachi, in 2006, the Italian Cooperation gave the hospital a small portable x-ray machine which could only serve 60 people per day. But this broke down in 2013 since it was serving over 200 patients per day. When it broke down, the hospital did not have the 50 million shillings needed to repair it.
In 2014, Onyachi added, Northern Uganda Health Integrated System, a USAID funded project gave donated to the hospital a second hand X-ray Machine but it only took three months and crashed.
Gulu hospital had hoped to get a new x-ray machine from the Italian government but this is yet to come. In November 2014, Domenico Fornara, the Italian Ambassador to Uganda while commissioning a Multi-million shillings Radiology unit at the hospital funded by Italian Corporation pledged to support the Radiology unit at the hospital with a 120,000 Euro grant about 448.801 million shillings, but that grant is yet to come.
“They funded the construction of the Radiology block and promised to fully equip it in a short while but up to now we have not received any news from them,’’ said Dr Onyanchi who added that government is aware of the challenge the hospital is facing.
For now, patients at Gulu hospital in need of x-ray are referred to private clinics or to other hospitals like Gulu Independent Hospital and the catholic owned St Mary’s Hospital Lacor.
Gulu Referral Hospital serves the entire northern Uganda population including some patients from South Sudan.
