'Stop using unqualified staff to manage patient data' – Allied Health Professions Council warns health facilities
The Allied Health Professions Council has cautioned health facilities against employing unqualified or unlicensed persons to manage patient data or perform specialised healthcare duties, warning that such practices violate the law.
The warning follows compliance monitoring exercises conducted by the Council in the Ho Zonal Area, where officials identified facilities allegedly assigning certain responsibilities to persons without the required qualifications or professional licences.
Speaking to Citi News, the Registrar of the Council, Professor Issahaku Shirazu, said almost all the facilities inspected were using unqualified personnel as health front desk officers instead of trained data managers.
“We have also seen that almost all the facilities we visited seem to be using non-qualified professionals as health front desk officers. This is by law an offence; they are supposed to have data managers.”
Professor Shirazu said the Council would formally write to health facilities across the region to remind them of the requirement that persons responsible for managing patient data must first be cleared by the Council.
“We will write to every single facility in the region and let them know that it is an offence to employ somebody to manage patient data without first seeking with the Council.”
He also expressed concern over instances where healthcare professionals allegedly perform duties outside their areas of training and licensing.
According to him, the practice is particularly worrying in dental facilities, where nurses are allegedly being assigned specialised duties for which they have not received the necessary training or professional authorisation.
“Our own colleagues have employed quacks. We call them quacks because even if you're a healthcare professional and you go and practice as a radiographer, you're a quack. You're not qualified to do that.”
Professor Shirazu cited cases where nurses were allegedly working in dental clinics despite lacking the requisite training and licences to perform specialised dental duties.
He stressed that anyone engaged to perform specialised healthcare services must have the appropriate professional training and be duly licensed by the Council before being allowed to practise.