For decades, Nigeria’s healthcare system has carried the weight of a growing population without a matching expansion in infrastructure and funding.
Public hospitals, envisioned as the backbone of care delivery, have struggled to meet expectations.
Nigeria’s healthcare system has, in many ways, reinvented itself, from overcrowded public wards to the steady rise of private medical giants.
According to data by WHO, the private sector provides close to 60% of health service delivery, in spite owning an estimated 30% of health facilities.
These institutions did not emerge in isolation. They are responses to gaps, to crises filled by a mix of entrepreneurs, medical professionals, and institutional investors who have built facilities that now rival international standards.
Some were established by practitioners who had seen advanced systems abroad and returned determined to replicate them locally. Others emerged from business minds that recognized healthcare as both a necessity and a viable long-term investment.
This feature article explores Nigeria’s largest private hospitals based on scale of operations, highlighting the individuals and organisations behind them, as well as the range of specialist care they provide.
Here are the owners of the largest hospitals in Nigeria by bed capacity.
- Founder Folorunso Alakija
The Modupe and Folorunso Alakija Medical Research and Training Hospital is a specialist teaching and research hospital in Osogbo, Osun State, developed and donated by Folorunso Alakija.
Alakija is one of Nigeria’s most prominent entrepreneurs, with business interests spanning fashion, oil and gas, and philanthropy. She serves as Group Managing Director of the Rose of Sharon Group and Executive Vice Chairman of Famfa Oil Limited, one of Nigeria’s most successful indigenous oil firms with major offshore assets.
She began her career in 1974 as an executive secretary and later worked with the First National Bank of Chicago and the International Merchant Bank of Nigeria, where she held roles in corporate affairs and treasury operations. She later transitioned into fashion after studying at the American College London and the Central School of Fashion in London, founding Supreme Stitches, which was later rebranded as the Rose of Sharon House of Fashion.
She has received global recognition, with Forbes listing her among the world’s most powerful women and ranking her among Africa’s richest women.
The facility was built as part of efforts to strengthen medical education and healthcare delivery in Nigeria and was later handed over to Osun State University. It operates as a 250-bed facility, designed to serve both as a treatment centre and a training ground for medical students and healthcare professionals.
It provides a wide range of services including general medicine, surgery, obstetrics and gynaecology, paediatrics, intensive care, and emergency services. These are supported by modern diagnostic and research facilities such as MRI and CT scanning, laboratories, and multiple operating theatres, allowing it to handle both routine and complex medical cases.
