Regina Caeli Hospital Committed to Quality Healthcare Despite Challenges…Fr Affusim



Rev. Fr Innocent Affusim, Manager, Regina Caeli Hospital Awka says the establishment is committed to delivering top notch quality healthcare services to the public despite the increasing cost of operation.


Afusim said this in an interview with newsmen in Awka while reacting to the newly introduced utility bill fee for health insurance policy holders at the hospital on Sunday.

Some members of the public under health insurance at the hospital had expressed outrage over the introduction of N1,000 utility bill fee for every patient.

Affusion lamented cessation of foreign aids to the mission hospital making the establishment to rely solely on internally generated revenue.

He said that healthcare services were becoming increasingly expensive and that additional measures had to be taken in order to prevent the hospital system from total collapse.


He said charge for utility bills was an internal policy of the hospital for health insurance policy holders who did not pay for registration and consultation adding that it could not be factored into their bills for clarity purposes.

He said in spite the challenges, the Regina Caeli remained the biggest privately owned hospital in Awka and environs and that the church was non compromising on standards and high quality healthcare services.

The priest commended the church and philanthropist who had been supporting the hospital assuring that the target was to make Regina Caeli a frontline multi specialist private hospital in Nigeria.

“Initially, the church was aided externally by some donor agencies but those foreign donors have all pulled out, whatever we are doing here is through internally generated revenues, though once in a while a philanthropist can intervene.

"This is one of the cheapest privately owned hospitals in Awka because, as it is a mission hospital, we try as much as possible to render the best meduack services at the lowest rate possible but we are not running a charity organisation.

"As for the utility bill we charge, it is a normal thing in the hospital environment which is factored in the bill payable by the public in various ways, some call it consultation fee others call it registration fee..

"Ours is different because those under insurance do not pay consultation fees, but they enjoy all the quality and standard services we provide, so for us here, the utility bill is to cover the cost of facilities and services we render, " he said.

Afusim said health insurance was a great intervention in the nations' health delivery system as it afforded a greater number of the public to access healthcare at an affordable rate.

He however called for a review of the coverage scope of the scheme to accommodate the prevailing inflation and market prices of approved drugs to enable policy holders enjoy wider services under the scheme.

"I think it has become necessary for review of health insurance coverage, most of what it allowed years ago had been taken out by inflation, I do not know how they will do it but I think policy holders need wider cover,* he said.

*We gave some of the best diagnostic equipment, an automated filing and queuing system, we have decentralised operations to reduce patent movement and tried to make the place as conducive as possible for workers and patients," he said.