Need To Reinvigorate Our Health System

THERE’S been far too much negative reporting around our health services and State hospitals in past months, and while we understand that Health Minister Richard Kamwi is serious about his mandate, he needs to do far more to get things back on track.

Much of the focus will inevitably fall on the Katutura State Hospital, where things just seem to be going from bad to worse in a number of crucial respects. This involves a range of issues: * where we do have crucial equipment, often said equipment is unaccountably stolen or disappears.Only recently there were media reports about wheels being stolen from an ambulance on hospital premises and computer screens disappearing; * where we do have infrastructure, it is often neglected or allowed to deteriorate beyond repair.There are constant complaints for example about the lifts in the State hospital that are often not working, only to be fixed when technicians from Johannesburg arrive.Likewise equipment is out of order for long periods; fences broken down, like at the Windhoek Central Hospital; let along not kept clean and hygienic and the list continues; * where we do have human skills, even though there may be a shortage of nurses, many of those employed are hostile to the public, worse still, the patients, forgetting that they are there to serve those very people, and the public perceptions of the treatment (or lack thereof) that they receive, is negative in the extreme.There may always be shortages of skilled personnel and even crucial equipment, but there is simply no excuse for poor planning and lack of hygiene and care for the infrastructure, let alone the most important of all, the people (patients) of this country who should be looked after by our health services.And despite media focus falling consistently on bad management at our hospitals and in our health system generally, the litany of complaints continues unabated, and there seems to be a total lack of political will to get things back on track.The most recent incident, which has aroused the public ire, is the death of an infant from a snakebite and the fact that this case was not given priority.Without apportioning blame to the hospital directly on this matter, as we are not yet in possession of the full facts, the authorities there definitely do need to look at a system of trying to prioritise cases brought to their attention.For a mother with an infant bitten by a snake to wait in line to be attended, behind a number of more minor cases of patients with heartburn or hangovers for example, should not be allowed to happen.There must surely be a process of screening to determine which patients to see first.If these measures are not already in place at the hospital then it is a matter of urgency that they should be implemented without further ado.Hopefully hospital authorities are already tasked with this, and ready to explain to the public both what happened in the case in question, and secondly, what they plan to do in future to avoid a re-occurrence.There should be zero tolerance at these institutions for abovementioned lack of hygiene or cleanliness and care taken about the infrastructure.Above and beyond all these, is that the primary concern be the patients themselves, and every effort made to ensure they get the best possible attention.We hope that the Minister of Health is going to tackle these issues as a matter of great urgency and ensure thereby that public confidence is reinstalled in our health services.In this process the jobs of hospital administrators must be on the line if there are no tangible improvements in the very near future.This involves a range of issues: * where we do have crucial equipment, often said equipment is unaccountably stolen or disappears.Only recently there were media reports about wheels being stolen from an ambulance on hospital premises and computer screens disappearing; * where we do have infrastructure, it is often neglected or allowed to deteriorate beyond repair.There are constant complaints for example about the lifts in the State hospital that are often not working, only to be fixed when technicians from Johannesburg arrive.Likewise equipment is out of order for long periods; fences broken down, like at the Windhoek Central Hospital; let along not kept clean and hygienic and the list continues; * where we do have human skills, even though there may be a shortage of nurses, many of those employed are hostile to the public, worse still, the patients, forgetting that they are there to serve those very people, and the public perceptions of the treatment (or lack thereof) that they receive, is negative in the extreme.There may always be shortages of skilled personnel and even crucial equipment, but there is simply no excuse for poor planning and lack of hygiene and care for the infrastructure, let alone the most important of all, the people (patients) of this country who should be looked after by our health services.And despite media focus falling consistently on bad management at our hospitals and in our health system generally, the litany of complaints continues unabated, and there seems to be a total lack of political will to get things back on track.The most recent incident, which has aroused the public ire, is the death of an infant from a snakebite and the fact that this case was not given priority.Without apportioning blame to the hospital directly on this matter, as we are not yet in possession of the full facts, the authorities there definitely do need to look at a system of trying to prioritise cases brought to their attention.For a mother with an infant bitten by a snake to wait in line to be attended, behind a number of more minor cases of patients with heartburn or hangovers for example, should not be allowed to happen.There must surely be a process of screening to determine which patients to see first.If these measures are not already in place at the hospital then it is a matter of urgency that they should be implemented without further ado.Hopefully hospital authorities are already tasked with this, and ready to explain to the public both what happened in the case in question, and secondly, what they plan to do in future to avoid a re-occurrence.There should be zero tolerance at these institutions for abovementioned lack of hygiene or cleanliness and care taken about the infrastructure.Above and beyond all these, is that the primary concern be the patients themselves, and every effort made to ensure they get the best possible attention.We hope that the Minister of Health is going to tackle these issues as a matter of great urgency and ensure thereby that public confidence is reinstalled in our health services.In this process the jobs of hospital administrators must be on the line if there are no tangible improvements in the very near future.