The Abia State Specialist Hospital and Diagnostic Centre, Umuahia, has recorded a major milestone in specialist healthcare delivery with the successful completion of its first major brain surgery.

The development was disclosed on Tuesday by the Commissioner for Information, Prince Okey Kanu, while briefing journalists on the outcome of the State Executive Council meeting held on Monday and chaired by Governor Alex Otti.

Kanu said the successful neurosurgical operation was part of the transformation taking place in Abia’s health sector through sustained investment by the Governor Otti administration.

Providing further details, the Commissioner for Health, Professor Enoch Uche, said the patient was a 19-year-old man who was brought to the hospital in a deep coma with a Glasgow Coma Scale score of six out of 15, which later deteriorated to five.

According to Uche, the patient was in a critical condition due to massive bleeding into the brain, which was putting pressure on the brainstem and made immediate surgery necessary.

He explained that transferring the patient to another medical facility could have put his life at greater risk, making the availability of neurosurgical facilities and specialists at the Umuahia hospital crucial to the intervention.

“Because we now have facilities to undertake brain surgery, and then we have brain surgeons in the State employed by His Excellency, that surgery was done,” Uche said.

The Commissioner disclosed that the medical team evacuated more than 100 millilitres of blood clot from the patient’s brain during the operation.

He added that the patient had subsequently begun moving his limbs and was receiving further treatment and monitoring at the hospital’s Intensive Care Unit.