The Executive Director of Butabika National Referral Hospital, Dr. Juliet Nakku has asked Parliament to approve the allocation of Shs5bn for the construction of a perimeter wall at the facility in order to improve the safety of inmates during treatment.
Nakku made the request while appearing before Parliament’s Health Committee where she had appeared with her team to submit the Hospital’s 2023/2024 ministerial policy statement, where she decried the rampant cases of patients escaping from the facility and end up drowning in the nearby swamps that are at the shores of Lake Victoria.
“Parents supported us to get funds for building a perimeter wall so that we secure it, we did start on that but then we have stalled because we no longer get the construction money at all. If we would get an extra Shs5bn in the next 2023/2024, we would be able to complete our perimeter wall, otherwise, we are still at risk of encroachment and patients escaping. That wall helps us keep our patients safe during treatment until they get better instead of having them escape and start roaming on the streets or drown inside the swamps,” said Nakku.
In the outpatient, you will find between 150-300 patients, the bulk of them are people with mental health, they come back for review and replenish their medication, some of them are new, usually they come with severe mental disorders the kind that we normally admit like bipolar disorder, psychosis, autism, alcohol and drug abuse and severe depression.
In the 2023/2024 national budget, Butabika National Referral Hospital has been allocated Shs22.791Bn, although this is a drop in the ocean of the money they need to run the facility, with Nakku appealing for the provision of an additional Shs3.5Bn for the recruitment of more staff to treat the patients in the facility, because currently, the 1000 patients are being attended to by only two nurses.
Nakku said, “The shortage of medical workers has brought us so many challenges because we need like one psychosis nurse to attend to 10 patients but as I speak, you find that one ward of 100-200 patients is being attended to by one nurse.”
In the 2023/2024 national budget, Butabika Hospital projects to spend Shs3.378Bn for mental health services which funds will be used to admit 7,890 patients, provide three meals to 351-840 patients daily, and the funds will also be used for conducting radiology investigations through X-rays and MRIs.
Butabika Hospital is also in need of Shs3.245Bn for purchase of uniforms for both patients and staff, but only Shs1Bn has been availed, leaving a funding gap of Shs2.386Bn, another request of Shs3Bn for medicines was put in by the Hospital, although only Shs2Bn was availed.
The hospital also needs Shs4.7Bn for food supplies, but only Shs2.439Bn has been availed, leaving a gap of Shs2.261Bn.
