A Nigerian-born medical doctor, Dr Seyi Oyesola is one of the popular and intelligent inventors in the medical world as he co-invented “hospital in a box” called CompactOR (Compact Operating Room) in 2007.

The “Hospital in a Box” was a portable set with the capability of bringing surgical care to all parts of the African continent.

According to information on Wikipedia, the CompactOR was movable and could be delivered to rural areas and other places with jeep or helicopter. 

Another amazing feature of the “hospital in a box” was that it could be set up in just ten minutes with a complete operating room with all the relevant surgical tools including the defibrillators, EKG monitoring, anesthesia and surgical lighting. 

It was solar paneled and could perform oral surgeries like the removal of wisdom teeth, removal of cataracts, gall bladders and appendices, and has successfully been used. 

The estimated cost of the basic hospital in a box was less than £50,000 (around US $77,350) which was about one fifth of the cost made available for the same services.

Oyesola was born in Nigeria but grew up in Cleveland, the United States. He graduated from high school in 1975 and came down to Nigeria where he obtained his Bachelors of Science Degree from the University of Lagos in 1986. 

Dr Seyi Oyesola practised in Nigeria for a short time before going to the United Kingdom and the US for specialised training in anesthesiology and critical care.

He explained that the idea and passion behind the creation of ‘hospital in a box’ was the experience of how people died from simple treatable and manageable illnesses like trauma, burn and heart attacks in community hospitals and health centres, when he came to the country to practise in 2015.

This was where the innovation on improving the health sector in the country began. He worked in the University of Lagos where he rose to lead a team of young doctors in anesthesiology.

Dr Oyesola was appointed consultant at Medway Maritime Hospital in the UK. In 1998, he joined the University of California, Los Angeles as a visiting Assistant Professor. In 1999, he became a consultant in anesthesia and critical care in the UK National Health Service (NHS). He also taught at the medical simulation center of the Imperial College School of Medicine in 2001.

Aside from the invention, he participated in performing the first successful kidney transplant at the Delta State University Teaching Hospital in 2014.

He has worked for more than 25 years on the special needs in anesthesiology and critical care, bringing innovation, developing high-tech medical equipment and training to African hospitals as well as visiting rural hospitals.

Oyesola’s achievements include co-authorship and publications of 8 articles on medicine, co-development of CompactOR, establishment of Practice Ventures in 1996, a company that developed and supplied high-tech medical equipment and training to African hospitals.

He also had a successful TED Global talk in 2007 on hospital in a box, he has a Membership of Professional Associations, Association of Anesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland, Royal Society of medicine, Intensive Care Society, UK and Royal College of Surgeons (Anaesthesia) Ireland.

[Vanguard]

The Kano state high court has affirmed the suspension of Abdullahi Ganduje as national chair of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The court, while granting an ex parte order, also restrained Ganduje from further parading himself as a member of the party.

On April 15, APC executives in Dawakin ward, under Tofa LGA of Kano, suspended Ganduje over alleged corruption.

However, the working committee of the APC in Kano subsequently nullified the suspension and punished the ward executives.

More to follow…

[TheCable]

Former Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai, has accused a northwest Governor of writing election results instead of conducting free and fair elections.

El-Rufai disclosed that the said Governor had approached him on how to conduct free and fair elections, but instead of heeding the advice given to him, the Northwest Governor went ahead to write election results as usual.

El-Rufai stated this on Monday in Maiduguri, while delivering a lead paper at a capacity-building workshop for top officials of the Borno State government.

Speaking against the backdrop of state electoral commissions as rigging tools in the hands of the state governors, El-Rufai recalled how he used electronic voting to conduct a free and fair local government areas elections during his tenure as governor.

He narrated that it was after the success of the local government elections that the Northwest state governor approached him to use his pattern, but after availing him of the technique used in conducting the elections, he went back to his state and wrote results of the local government elections he conducted instead of conducting it electronically.

El-Rufai, during his lecture, called for the scrapping of the state electoral commissions, arguing that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) could handle all local government elections.

“While I was the Governor of Kaduna State, I introduced electronic voting and conducted local government election with it. After the election, we lost about three to four local government areas to the opposition, because of the credibility of the election. And because we were transparent in the election, some of those opposition candidates decamped to our party because of our fairness in the election.

“I remember that one governor from the Northwest who loved the conduct of the election through electronic voting asked me to assist him with the technology I used in the election, but because it has the state logo, I told him that it would not cost more than 10,000 US dollars, so that he can get the equipment to conduct his state LGA election electronically. But after that conversation, I did not hear from him again, he went back home and conducted his election by writing the results as usual,” El-Rufai said.

Ex-Minister of Women Affairs, Hajia Maryam Inna Ciroma, has chided latter day leaders of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), for elevating selfish interests to the detriment of the party and democracy.

Ciroma, who was at one time National Woman Leader of the PDP, said this at a press conference and Diaspora Grassroots Engagement Parley, organized by the Directorate of Diaspora And Foreign Missions of PDP Rescue Mission International, in Abuja, on Tuesday.

She specifically lamented PDP’s departure from the ideals of its founding fathers.

According to her, the PDP was formed to promote inclusive democracy which will serve as a basis for rapid national growth; an ideal which those at the helm of affairs have since abandoned for a system which promotes selfishness and greed.

The Ex-Minister also accused Nigeria elites, particularly leaders of political parties, of putting their selfish interests over and above those of their various parties ,thus destroying the very fabric of the parties.

She said, “The basis for the formation of PDP has crashed because when the PDP was formed, it was it was called Peoples Democratic Party.

“The people that started the party were very passionate about democracy. “They stood and fought the military to ensure that Nigeria returns to democracy.

“Unfortunately, as it is now, there is no democracy, not even in Nigeria as a whole. All our political parties are not democratic.

” So, Nigerians especially the elites, will have to stand up and look at this issue of democracy in Nigeria. You can see that in some countries they hold democracy seriously as if it is their religion.

“Go to America, as far as they are concerned, democracy is Number one. But here in Nigeria we have thrown democracy away.

“We are not talking of fairness, we are not talking of justice. Our party, when it was formed, it was with the belief that Nigeria needs a united a party.

“That’s why our symbol is umbrella. People’s interest have overtaken the interest of the party and the interest of Nigeria.

Also speaking at the event, the Director-General of the PDP Rescue Mission International, Comrade Vic-Morrow Ulo explained that the mission of his group is to reform, rebuild and return PDP to its winning ways by ensuring that in the eyes of its members and public.

He said, “PDP is seen as a rules based political party, distinctively different from others and fully aligned to the provisions of her constitution and that of the country.

“The PDP Rescue Mission International has an approach which is driven by a redemptive and transformative agenda and focused on getting PDP transformed into a strong rules based political party, which is equally answerable to the yearnings of Nigerians.

“If there is anything we must be mindful about, it is the fact that the younger generation has lost confidence in the PDP of today”.