A Medical Knowledge Fiesta, which seeks to strengthen the scientific base of medical practitioners in the country, began in Accra on Monday.

The four-day Fiesta, which is being organised by the Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons in collaboration with the Ghana Physicians and Surgeons Foundation (North America) and the African Partners Medical of the United States of America (USA), is on the theme: “Cutting Edge Updates for Medical Practice in Ghana”.

Speaking at the event, the President of the Sickle Cell Foundation of Ghana, Prof. Kwaku Ohene-Frempong, noted that medical practitioners carried many responsibilities along with the simple privilege of being health caretakers.

Prof. Ohene-Frempong said science was an endless search for answers to questions posed by previous knowledge and assumptions, adding that knowledge were limitless and medical practice continued to benefit from a large amount of new information.

According to him, while culture might influence application of science and technology, it was dangerous to use the web of culture to distort scientific findings and to ascribe untested and unproven conclusion to observations made as if the Ghanaian or the African is fundamentally different from others.

“The laws of physics apply to us all whether we understand them or do not know or understand them. Any model of a mobile phone works the same way in the hand of anyone be it an electrical engineer or a kenkey seller,” he added.

Prof. Ohene-Frempong stressed that the African’s traditional respect for and worship of age had mostly suppressed curiosity of the intellectually nimble as well as young medical scientists which prevented them from constantly searching for new information.

He, therefore, called on practitioners not to dismiss new ideas and approaches that had succeeded elsewhere, but think of how to adapt new information to change practices in order to serve better the people who had placed the care of their health in their hands.

He said with so much medical information being produced every day, even the brightest of doctors could not adequately keep up, and, therefore, practitioners should not be ashamed to admit when they did not know, but rather ask someone else who might know better.

The Sickle Cell Foundation President urged his colleagues to serve with care as compassion was the medium through which humans demonstrated gratitude towards each other, be they rich or poor.

“The art of medicine requires us to be warm, sympathetic, and understanding to our patients. These qualities may outweigh the science we know and the skill we have as surgeons,” he said.


ISD