A fresh perspective is evolving on the health status of President Muhammadu Buhari who is currently on medical vacation in the United Kingdom.

Professor Femi Williams, a certified physician in Anatomic pathology from London and Ireland, has used a recent published photograph of the President to arrive at a preliminary clinical diagnosis of what may have gone wrong with Buhari’s health.

He ruled out dehydration, anaemia and jaundice but called for further investigation on the history of Buhari’s ear infection with a view to determining the true state of his health.

Details of his ailment remain a secret leaving room for speculations in many quarters.

However, Professor Williams in a statement, ‘Clinical diagnosis of President Buhari’s requests for medical vacation’ he said Nigerians have a “constitutional right to know the health of our President.’

“It is a moral prerogative to be concerned about our President’s health. The physical and mental well being of most Presidents in the world are usually not shrouded in secrecy because details of the health of current and past Presidents in the developed world are published in the public domain.

“Speculations about the health of some of our leaders should not be subject to benign or malignant analyses by medically qualified and non-medically qualified pundits.”

Prof. Williams who said he used a recent photograph of the President to arrive at a preliminary clinical diagnosis threw some light on the photograph “that may allay the fears of all the concerned citizens of this nation and in the Diaspora.”

His words: “As a board certified physician in internal medicine and a board certified physician in Anatomic pathology from London and Ireland I hereby venture to throw some light on this invaluable photograph that may allay the fears of all the concerned citizens of this nation and in the Diaspora.

“My negative findings, based on this single photograph are as follows:

*The president is not dehydrated

*The president is not clinically anaemic

*The President is not clinically jaundiced

*For his age, there are no wrinkles on his forehead indicative of good preservation and nutrition and

*The national costume does not permit a superficial assessment of whether he has lost weight or not.

“My positive findings based on this single snapshot are as follows:

*The photograph shows some degree of clubbing of the fingers

*the photo shows a small nodule on the lateral aspect of two fingers and one of these bumps has a hyper pigmented rim suggestive of an infective etiology (cause) in the recent past

*there is mild reduplication of skin over the knuckles (not enough for elastosis).

*there are multiple transverse opacities on the nails particularly of the left hand suggestive of an infection? Viral or other infections.”

Continuing, Prof. Williams said: “The summary of these positive findings suggest that if the clubbing of the fingers are not congenital, the President may have a disease associated with finger clubbing, some of which are not serious and some of which are serious and cannot be speculated upon. The most serious of these is cancer somewhere.

“One relevant question to ask is whether the President smoked cigarettes at some point in his life. Furthermore the multiple opacities in the nails suggest some infective pathologies at different times as these opacities appear layered in disposition.

“The little bump on the finger with a hyper pigmented rim is benign and suggests a previous infection or even an insect bite. In my opinion, there may be no cause for alarm if the finger clubbing is something he was born with. If not there may be cause for alarm if the underlying cause is a serious disease and there are many to consider.

“The significance of his past history of an ear infection is worthy of further investigation as head and neck cancers may masquerade in a number of ways.

“It will be in the best interest of all concerned for more information to be released as extended requests for sick leave make the prognosis to be suspect.

“For those who may wish to be more enlightened on finger clubbing there are several references on the Internet and text books of medicine.

“I may be wrong as this synopsis is based on a newspaper snapshot which is presumed to be of recent vintage. In that case this is not meant to mislead the public but to fill a huge void in the absence of reliable information.”

About Professor Williams

Femi Williams is an eminent professor of medicine. He graduated from Trinity College, University of Dublin in 1961.

He obtained arts and medical degrees with post graduate medical education and Fellowships in Internal Medicine and Pathology at Queens University and Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast, Ireland.

He also got Board Certification in Internal Medicine and Pathology UK and Ireland.

He held faculty positions at Dublin University in Pathology and later at Ibadan University Nigeria.

Williams was Professor and Chair of Pathology, University of Ibadan and University College Hospital Ibadan as well as

Foundation Dean and Chief Medical Director, College of Medicine, University of Calabar.

He is a visiting Professor Universities of Minnesota, Howard, Vanderbilt, New Jersey, Hopkins Cleveland Clinic as well as Executive Secretary, Science Technical Research Commission, (STRC) African Union, Addis Ababa.

The pathologist is also chairman, Committee on Solar Energy for Africa and chairman of Board Africa Union Center for Soil Science, Harare, Zimbabwe.

He is Scholar-in-Residence National Cancer Institute, Fogarty International Center, Bethesda, Maryland.

Williams is founder and Director, African Cancer Center, Lagos and fellow African Academy of Science.

He is author of over 100 peer reviewed publications in medical journals and seven monographs/books.

He has several national and international awards to his credit.

•Credit (except headline): The Nation on Sunday.

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