Senegal Amputation Crisis: 70% Linked to Diabetes – Abass Ndao Hospital

2023-11-10 15:46:44

Dakar, Nov 10 (APS) – The president of the scientific days commission of the Abass Ndao hospital, Professor Maimouna Ndour Mbaye, revealed that 70% of non-traumatic amputations recorded in Senegal are linked to diabetes, citing a study carried out in surgical structures.

“A study was carried out in the country’s surgical structures with results showing that 70% of amputations carried out are caused by diabetes,” she said while hosting a press conference on Thursday, as a prelude to the medical days of the Abass Ndao hospital center whose theme is “diabetes mellitus”.

She clarified that three quarters of operations are “major” amputations which affect the legs as opposed to “minor” amputations which only affect the toes.

According to her, “diabetes is taking over all other pathologies. Which was not to be the case. Everyone feels concerned at the forefront.”

Citing the statistics of amputations at the Marc Sankalé center, she affirmed that “diabetics are 25 times more likely to be amputated than non-diabetics”.

» Diabetes mellitus is when patients’ urine is sugary, because the kidneys try to remove sugar from the blood by passing it into the urine. When we talk about diabetes in general, it is diabetes mellitus which is by far the most common,” she explained.

There is another type of diabetes that is not sweet and called “insipid”. Very rare, it has nothing to do with diabetes due to excess blood sugar, she says.

Doctor Ibrahima Sow, president of the establishment medical commission, informed that at least one toe amputation is carried out per day at the Marc Sankalé center.

“It happens that we do two amputations a day. (…) These diabetic wounds are taking over our surgical activity,” noted the doctor.

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According to Dr. Sow, “half of the departments are occupied by diabetic feet.” He pleaded for “decentralized management of these cases in other health establishments”.

At this rate, he warns, the Marc Sankalé center will only receive “diabetic feet and visceral surgical activity will disappear”.

Amputations are “disabling” and scare patients who no longer want to come to the hospital for treatment, he observed, recalling that “there are measures after amputations with the use of prostheses, orthopedic devices.

For Doctor Seynabou Lô, member of the committee organizing the days, the reception capacity has largely been reached at the Abass Ndao hospital. “We are receiving more and more patients, the diabetology and surgery departments are full (…) with the closure of Le Dantec hospital,” she said.

The center which today receives patients from Le Dantec for surgery no longer has the capacity to absorb all these diabetes patients, the doctor warned.

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