Dr Olutoye’s Feat At US Hospital
Dr Olutoye’s Feat At US Hospital
THE recent appointment of a US based Nigerian surgeon, Dr Oluyinka Olutoye, as the Sugeon-in-Chief of the National Children’s Hospital in the United States is no doubt a great feat that has once again put Nigeria on the world map in the medical profession. Dr Olutoye, a native of Idoani in Ose Local Government Area of Ondo State, is by his appointment to lead one of the largest children’s hospital surgery departments in the world where he will oversee eleven surgical departments. The Ohio State University has equally appointed Dr Olutoye as Professor and the E. Thomas Boles Chair of Pediatric Surgery of the institution’s College of Medicine which confers on him the responsibility of training the next generation children surgeons.
DR Olutoye’s professional prowess first came to limelight in 2016 when he led a team of doctors that carried out a surgery on a baby in-utero in a Texas hospital. His team brought out a fetus from a mother who was pregnant for 23 weeks and five days, operated on it, and successfully removed a growing tumor. They sent the fetus back to the uterus and closed it after a five-hour surgery making the mother to carry the pregnancy for another twelve weeks before the baby was successfully delivered.
INTERESTINGLY, Dr Olutoye’s medical training started in Nigeria with a Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) degree from Obafemi Awolowo College of Health Sciences, Ogun State University in 1988 before his post-graduate medical education in pediatrics at Howard University and District of Columbia General Hospital. He later enrolled at the Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA, in 1996 for his doctoral degree in anatomy and then sought additional training in pediatric, fetal and thoracic surgery at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
DR Olutoye later took up a teaching position at Baylor College of Medicine and, with his colleague, Dr. Darrell Cass, they established the Texas Children’s Fetal Center at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston Texas. He has been in teaching and professional practice for over two decades.
The Hope joins Nigerians globally to celebrate this illustrious son of the country and a worthy ambassador of the black race. He is a good example of the Nigerian spirit anywhere anytime. Nigerians are noted for excellence and hard work and this he has demonstrated in faraway America. His background training in Nigerian educational institutions notwithstanding, Dr Olutoye proved the quality in him by distinguishing himself both in theory and practice as a sojourner in the US. This shows that Nigerians are associated with good things in spite of the negative publicity the country has been witnessing in the eye of the world in recent times. His is a clear departure from the bad image created by some Nigerians who go abroad to engage in unwholesome activities in a bid to get rich at all cost.
DR Olutoye is just one of the many Nigerians who have distinguished themselves globally in various fields of human endeavor ranging from medicine, science, arts, music, academics among others. It is on record that many of the inventors and specialists in all these fields in America, Canada, Europe, Asia and Africa are Nigerians. We therefore call on the Federal Government to accord Dr Olutoye national recognition to encourage him and inspire others to continue to fly the flag of Nigeria high wherever they go.
ANOTHER lesson to learn from this feat is that there are many potential Olutoyes who are groping in the dark or are being frustrated at home due to the lack of enabling environment for growth and development in the country. Perhaps if Olutoye has remained in medical practice in Nigeria he would not have been able to carry out such a near impossible surgery in 2016 which has earned him global recognition. This is because, over there, he has access to modern facilities and good working condition which are non-adequate or almost non-existent here. That is why most of our best brains seek greener pastures abroad where they believe they can better ply their trade. This has led to brain drain and loss of competent hands to other countries no thanks to mass exodus of professionals out of Nigeria almost on daily basis.
THE Hope therefore calls on government to court the likes of Olutoye and other Nigerians in diaspora who have made their mark in their various callings with a view to tapping from their wealth of experience and making them to look back and seek for ways to develop our own versions of their professions else, we stand the risk of permanently losing them to their countries of sourjorn.