Ministry of Health chief radiographer Nelson Nkosi says government is introducing radiography in health centres nationwide to bring radiology services closer to the people.
Speaking in Lilongwe on Saturday on the sidelines of World Radiography Day commemorations, he observed that currently, radiology services are confined to district hospitals, which makes it expensive to move patients requiring X-ray and CT scans from remote locations.
The radiologist acknowledged that although there is more to be done to fulfil this plan, the process has already started.
Said Nkosi: “Currently, most X-rays are concentrated in district hospitals and we have just managed to move a little bit [such] that, for instance, we now have a radiographer at Chonde Health Centre who is providing X-ray and Ultrasound services there.”
He said the lack of radiology services in rural health centres is costly, citing Likoma Island where he said it costs about K1 million to transport a patient from there to the mainland to access radiology services.
Nkosi said with the scaling up of the services, there will also be need to train more radiographers to boost the 280 practitioner the country has.
Radiographers Association of Malawi president Agnes Sankhani said some institutions such as Malawi University of Science and Technology and Kamuzu University of Health Sciences have introduced radiography courses.
This year, World Radiography Day was commemorated under the theme ‘Empowering health care through imaging excellence’.
