CONCERNED about how to boost the extremely low density of health professionals in  Jigawa State, Barrister Muhammed Tahir would want a reorientation for northerners on girl child education.

“People in this part of the North have to wake up to encourage their wives, women generally, to go for further studies and specialise. There are very intelligent girls who should have added value to the development of the North but when they marry, you never hear anything from them again.”

Tahir, who works in the Jigawa State Ministry of Justice, was so excited at the success of his wife, Dr. Yamuna Aminu Kani, who recently became a fellow of the West African College of Surgeons and also for being the first woman from Jigawa State to become a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist. He could not help but roll out the drums to celebrate.

He says he was fulfilled because he was part of the entire struggle and challenge of  carrying the  pregnancies of his four children even as she scaled the hurdles.

Tahir believes that if his wife can make it, more women from Jigawa State can also read medicine and be part of efforts to save the state from the dearth of female health professionals.

“In Islam, it is even compulsory to seek knowledge irrespective of gender; it is a sin to deprive any person access to knowledge. I feel honoured and fulfilled,” he said.

The disposition of Tahir can only be appreciated when one understands the situation in the North where women are married and their education truncated just to be housewives and kept away from the public.

Instead of 200 doctors and 1000 nurses per 1000, 000 persons as the national average, in Jigawa State it is 16 doctors and 83 nurses for the same population.

This has contributed to the poor quality of healthcare delivery and poor health indices, particularly the high maternal and child mortality rates observed in the state. The maternal mortality ratio is estimated at 2,000 deaths per 100, 000 live births —- more than twice the national average. That means for every 1,000 children born, an estimated 166 die by the age of five years.

This was what the first female fellow of West African College of Surgeons from Jigawa State, Dr. Aminu Kani said ignited her passion to read medicine and specialise in Obstetrics and Gynaecology to come back and save the situation.

She vowed to give her time and resources to save pregnant mothers and their babies no matter the challenge.

The process that led to her ambition dated back to when she was in primary school during career counselling. She said she kept imagining herself becoming a medical doctor who would come back to help her state.

She said she was eight years when she followed her mother to the hospital for her fourth delivery when she observed a bed for the mother and the other for the baby. “I felt like being one of the doctors who took charge of the safe delivery of the babies. When I got to primary five and we were being counselled on career, I still had that feeling of wanting to become a doctor.

“I fell in love with a picture on one of the science textbooks; Macmillan Science, of a woman on maternity bed and the baby on a cradle. I loved pictures of babies.”

She attended the Science Staff School Ajaokuta, where the father was working, from JSS1 to JSS3.

After her junior secondary school, she proceeded to Taura Science Secondary School where she came tops and was given an award as the best overall student; but she had to return to Ajaokuta where she passed out in 1996.

“So I decided to continue at Ajaokuta and because there was no competition at Taura. I finished my secondary education at Ajaokuta in 1996 though I sat for JAMB in December 1995 towards the SSCE Examination and I was offered admission in the University of Maiduguri to read Medicine.”

She said she was glad to have started a step towards realising her dream of one day coming back to contribute her quota to rewriting the sad stories that abound in her state of Jigawa, where two out of every 20 women die during childbirth.

Many women died during delivery under the supervision of local midwives, who use herbs, prayers and other methods.

The World Bank, at a time, classified the state as the poorest in Nigeria and where majority of the women still deliver at home.

Kani said her training in Maiduguri was stressful because of the distance and it was full of hurdles. There was so much competition with many coming from different schools. “However all through the programme, I had no carryover or resit.

“I married in my fifth year when I was already in my clinicals. You know the first three years are in the university. I met my husband in 200-level while he was in Maiduguri for his NYSC programme in August 1998.

“I had my first baby three months to my first set of our final examination. My greatest challenge was how to get a nanny, an adult, because our people have this phobia for going far from home. I changed five nannies in five months because they were not used to the environment, so they kept leaving without notice.”

Continuing, she said the sixth person stayed for six months, which was the end of the examination. She graduated as medical doctor when the baby was one year.

“But the last year was my most challenging, I wept several times and I missed classes when the nannies absconded. I was alone and my husband was working in Jigawa, while my parents were in far away Abuja.

“I came back to Aminu Kano Teaching Hospital (AKTH) in 2004 to start the one-year housemanship and I finished in 2005. I went for the one year compulsory national youth service for which I was given a concessional posting to serve in Kano as a married woman. During the service year, I went for my primary exam, which is the first exam (as I wanted to specialise in Obstetrics and Gynaecology) in Ibadan at the West African College of Surgeons in April 2006. I was also pregnant for my second baby.

“Here again, it was challenging because I was afraid of travelling to Ibadan by air because all my colleagues were going by road so I had to go by road; but my legs were swollen on arrival. I was lucky to have passed the examination at one sitting.” Immediately after that, she secured an employment with the AKTH.

Aminu Kani said that year was the most stressful as a resident doctor, especially in the first month. “My second baby was five months old and for a programme that has no concession for gender, there was a period I was away from my baby for two days without breastfeeding her. I suffered breast pain, anxiety and stress due to overwork and the emotional burden that I had not seen my baby for 42 hours. That night, I called my husband to inform him I was no longer going to continue with the residency. I called my father also, but they both insisted I should carry on. They encouraged me and I made up my mind to carry on.

“Three years down the line, I was due for part one exam in the residency. I was pregnant and I thought I was going to deliver before the exam, but I ended up with a Caesarean section on the 4th of September 2009 barely two weeks to the examination.

“One week after the naming ceremony, I travelled to Ibadan with my baby, nanny and the driver. To the glory of God, I passed the examination at a single sitting. The following week, I proceeded to Lagos for the Part 1 National Examination. It was most challenging as we had to travel with my husband as nanny. I did not make it at the national exam. So, I settled down for the West African College, which is more prestigious after the compulsory posting as a senior registrar.

“I started thinking of relocating to Dutse so I could join my husband from where I would write my exam. So, I relocated in February 2011 to join Rasheed Shekoni Hospital when they had two visiting consultants from AKTH. They were putting me through and with the encouragement from the CMD, I was able to write my exam in April and I was also pregnant for my fourth baby. Unfortunately, I failed one aspect and I had to go back six months later to remedy that aspect. Finally in October, I went to Ibadan with my three-months-old baby, husband to rewrite the exam for which I was successful.”

She said her advice for other women is to press on to achieve because they can also make it, if she could, despite all the challenges that confronted her.