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HANOVER PARK: PLANS TO BOOST HEALTHCARE
Emergency situation NIKITA SYLVESTER
Insufficient space at the emergency services unit of the Hanover Park Community Health Centre is one of the concerns troubling provincial health minister Theuns Botha. His recent unannounced visit to the facility was designed to follow up on complaints, which surfaced some months ago, about waiting times at the pharmacy. “There was a queue at the pharmacy, but nothing out of the ordinary. Patients seemed to understand why they were waiting and that they would all receive their medication parcel at the end of the wait,” Botha explains. But despite his appraisal of the much improved situation of dispensing medication since his previous visit, he raised a few other concerns. He explains that the emergency services unit is constrained by space and should be at least double in size. “The facility was built 35 years ago at a time when the population was much smaller and the burden of disease very different from what it is now. Under the circumstances, the staff is doing the best they can,” he commends. In an area where violence is rife and the community depends greatly on the only health care facility in Hanover Park, residents are in agreement of the urgency for the emergency unit to be expanded. Botha noted that although he was immensely impressed by the staff and management of the facility who were all helpful and friendly, the facility required more staff onboard to provide a more adequate service. He adds that vacancies for staff are in the process of being filled. “The birth unit also has a shortage of beds and should be enlarged by adding 50% space,” he says. Botha has already got the ball rolling to rectify these matters by requesting the
health department take heed of his concerns and put forward proposals on which problems can be addressed within the available budget. Hanover Park resident Fagmi Abass feels the reins need to be tightened at the trauma unit. He says when he recently rushed a woman with two broken arms to the facility he was told by a security guard outside that he had to wait because the emergency unit was too full. The woman’s arms were completely swollen and she was in agonizing pain. Abass noticed that the security guard, however, allowed a suspected gang member who was injured enter the premises. “I don’t understand how the security guard can decide who gets to go in and who should wait. He is not a qualified doctor,” Abass insists. When they finally made it inside the hospital, they were forced to sit and wait a few hours before being assisted, he says. He has seen many people sitting at the facility with heart or asthma problems, but feels that because the staff can’t see any physical injuries they don’t tend to these patients immediately. “Just because they don’t have stab or gunshot wounds it doesn’t mean they cannot die,” he says. Abass feels a health committee needs to be elected again to communicate with the facility’s management on behalf of the community. Gigi Richards, a community worker who was part of the previous local health committee, feels that if the staff at the facility just put a little more effort into their jobs, the situation would already be better. “People still phone us day and night complaining that they are waiting for hours at the hospital and have still not been helped. This is not right and it is not fair,” she says.
CHAIN REACTION: Venetia Orgill is leading the fight against drug abuse. Her only son hanged himself five years ago after embracing drugs for 10 years. He had been clean for three years when he committed suicide five years ago. In order to draw attention to her cause, she chained herself to a traffic light outside the Provincial Legislature Build ing in the CBD. She is appealing to South Africans to sign her Million Signatures Campaign to raise awareness about drug abuse and to action government to do more. Orgill has collected 5000 signatures. “With no followup programmes for recovering drug addicts, it is difficult for them to not relapse,” she says. “How many more children need to die before laws around drugs will change?” PHOTO: SHAFIEK JOSEPH
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