The lack of a Resident Obstetric Gynecologist at the Asante Mampong Municipal Hospital in the Ashanti Region is raising life-threatening concerns.

Emergency cases depending on their complexity are either booked for a visiting obstetric specialist on Fridays or transferred.

The lack of a General Surgeon, an Eye Specialist, and obsolete medical equipment is making it increasingly difficult to save lives in a referral hospital which serves over 100 communities.

The Mampong Municipal Hospital, a referral facility for more than five districts in the Region was built over 40 years and receives over 50000 patients annually.

Space is not a challenge as the facility boasts of a 69-bed maternity unit, over 110-bed capacity wards, nurses space and other underutilized spaces.

The facility’s headache stems from inadequate specialist as it currently has six doctors, one dental surgeon, and five general doctors.

Emergency cases depending on the complexity will have to wait for a specialist from another hospital on a scheduled date or take a referral to the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital, Manhyia or Suntreso Government hospitals in Kumasi.

Out of 104 referrals in September this year, 34 were obstetric cases with eight of them in need of urgent support, reports Joy News' Erastus Asare Donkor.

According to the reporter, in September, the Mampong Municipal hospital recorded 123 deaths;  two maternal deaths and three children under five.

The hospital also recorded 35 still-births within the same period.

Though hospital officials cite ruptured uterus, intrauterine deaths, irregular antenatal visits and other complications as the cause of maternal and child deaths, they have called for the urgent need for a specialist obstetric gynecologist, a general surgeon and eye specialist to boost health delivery.