State Hospitals

[Jennifer Lopez]

I offered to take an elderly person to a state hospital yesterday. This was for the purpose of his regular checkup and chronic medication. It's sad:

1. At 5.45am there were already about 200 people in the queue waiting to register.
2. At 8am having completed his registration, we proceeded to the clinic to await the doctor.
(The building is old, dilapidated, and decades old used counters, benches, beds and other hospital equipment are an eyesore.)
3. We wait another 2 hours in that queue and finally he's called in to see the doctor.
4. The doctor decides he needs bloods done.
5. We wait 45 minutes to get the "blood tests" done.
6. Back to the doctor - told to wait - kick up a fuss - get sent to front of queue.
7. Back to the hospital dispensary. No. 672 in the queue. Two hours later and finally get medication.
8. Home at 2.30pm

Whilst I commend the staff working at these hospitals for the sterling job they do, having to work UNDER these conditions daily - THE GOVERNMENT OF THE DAY SUCKS!

 

[Jennifer Lopez]

PS. Pre/Post operative patients are transported between floors in public lifts.

 

[Leimie]

So I ended up taking someone to the emergency room of a public hospital at around 4pm. After a few hours he gets a number. After waiting almost a full day he gets attended to (22 hours) and this was only because the chief radiologist recognised him. What a joke!

Sent from my HTC Desire using MyBroadband Android App

 

[buyeye]

The health services run by the life group for prisoners are run much better.
The funny part is that our tax money pays for them like it pays for state hospitals.

 

[genetic]

My two only experiences with state hospitals (Victoria & Groote Schuur hospitals) was actually quite pleasant.

 

[Creag]

Experience with state hospitals will be determined by the staff administrating it. I used to visit Greys Hospital (to visit the nurses on night duty - their 'lunch' hour) and the wards and hospital in general was well run. Patients received good care, etc. It had a lot to do with the ladies and gents who were nursing there.

My father-in-law stayed in a state hospital for a few days recently in Colesberg and he was complimentary of the staff and stay.

My wife is a qualified ICU professional registered nurse. She works in a doctors practice now based in a private hospital. She has seen similarly poor care in private wards and hospitals.

Not all state run hospitals are bad, although in general standards have dropped and extremely poor. Not all privately run hospitals are good. It comes down to the staff and nurses running it. Salaries for nurses in general are shocking. More should be done to improve their salaries and working conditions. A healthy working environment will make a big difference to patient care to.

 

[Jennifer Lopez]

Experience with state hospitals will be determined by the staff administrating it. I used to visit Greys Hospital (to visit the nurses on night duty - their 'lunch' hour) and the wards and hospital in general was well run. Patients received good care, etc. It had a lot to do with the ladies and gents who were nursing there.

My father-in-law stayed in a state hospital for a few days recently in Colesberg and he was complimentary of the staff and stay.

My wife is a qualified ICU professional registered nurse. She works in a doctors practice now based in a private hospital. She has seen similarly poor care in private wards and hospitals.

Not all state run hospitals are bad, although in general standards have dropped and extremely poor. Not all privately run hospitals are good. It comes down to the staff and nurses running it. Salaries for nurses in general are shocking. More should be done to improve their salaries and working conditions. A healthy working environment will make a big difference to patient care to.

Agreed.
But in addition the standards of servicing outpatients are low or non existent.

Process efficiency is very lacking .You simply cannot have two staff member's manning a counter that is servicing the registration for +-500 outpatients per hour as was the case yesterday. In addition there were only 2 doctors available to service all of the patients. A nurse told me that often patients are asked to leave at the end of the day and return the next day when there is no time left for a doctor to see them - this once ended in mutiny as people were frustrated having been sat there for 8-10 hours - mostly from 4/5am in the morning.

Although strike action seems unfair

 

[Lupus]

Try the hospitals here in Gauteng, my wife before her medical aid kicked in was sent to Helen Joseph for her appendix, we arrived just before 6am, I left that night at midnight having had her just booked in. They only operated on her the next day at 3pm.

 

[The_Assimilator]

Every 6 months I have to go to Groote Schuur for a checkup and prescription for my eczema. I have to take an ENTIRE DAY of sick leave from work to do this. Even if I get there before 7:00, I never leave before 15:00. Worst part of this, it generally takes the dermatologist under 15 minutes to examine me and give me the same prescription I've had for years - the rest of the time I spend waiting in queues.

Also, the toilets at those hospitals are DISGUSTING due to vandalism. People who destroy public property like that should get the death sentence, no exceptions.

 

[seventhson]

Anything that has to do with the state is Krap. end of story.

 

[HavocXphere]

Jip. Public hospitals scare me too. I was born in one, but they've changed since then.

The health services run by the life group for prisoners are run much better.

Reminds me of this news article the other day. US prisons serve more nutritious food than the cafeterias in schools. :/

PS. Pre/Post operative patients are transported between floors in public lifts.

Is that abnormal? I don't recall ever using a designated lift in a private hospital either...

 

[Tosser]

Anything that has to do with the state is Krap. end of story.

And thats what I expected when my Dad was rushed to Groote Schuur with a heart attack.

He arived in a private vehicle.
When he arrived, there was a wheelchair waiting. They raced him into the operating theatre and performed emergency surgery.

THe only reason he is alive today is due to the efficiency and dedication of the staff who assisted him.

I doubt this would have been the case if he was taken to a private hospital. They would probably still be haggling whether he has medical aid, and whether he has the correct pre admission code....

 

[Kloofvreter]

This is what you can expect with state hospitals crowded with useless drunks who got stabbed or hit with a bottle while arguing over a cigarette butt. I pity the nursing staff who has to work with these people.

 

[AniV]

I once accompanied a guy to the state hospital in Attridgeville. He'd had a motorbike accident and shattered his knee. This was at around 4 or 5pm.
I made him give me all his personal possessions because I *knew* they'd be stolen, but he insisted on keeping his cellphone with him. I told him to sleep on top of it and never let it out his sight.

It took two hours to just get him admitted. Fortunately for him it ONLY took 2 hours - he had me to go do the admission for him. If you don't have a proxy to do it for you, you either get sent to the queue yourself, or you have to wait until a nurse or someone takes pity on you and helps you. I sat in the queue next to people who looked barely alive, bleeding, coughing, and unable to walk. It was horrific.

Once inside the emergency ward, his bed got parked in a corridor and he was left there. I ran around from place to place trying to get ANY doctor to take a peek at his knee and utter the words we already knew were coming - "Xrays". I finally snagged a doctor walking down a corridor and begged him for 2minutes of his time. He got us to Xrays. Xrays took about an hour and then we were back in the corridor, parked and waiting. I continued rambling around from doctor to nurse to push for him to be helped. Finally we got a doctor to look at the Xray and say what we already knew - "knee/leg/ankle is crushed, need to be admitted, need to go to orthopaedics, need surgery".

Took another hour or so to get someone from Orthopaedics to come down and collect him and take him to the ward. This was where we parted ways. It was about 11pm when hubby got me at the hospital and took me home.

It took four days for them to schedule his knee operation. In the meantime he just lay there in pain. Apparently the nurses told him he had to get someone from home to bring him bedding and food - they didn't feed him. They didn't even want to help him get to the toilet. His cellphone was stolen out from underneath him (lliterally!). He finally went for the op, they put pins and plates and whatnot in his knee and reconstructed it. He was released the day after the op because they needed the bed. He had to source his own crutches.

A few days after his release he came to collect his belongings from me. He bought me a box of chocolates to say thanks for my help. It was really sweet of him. After everything he had been through... he said he would do whatever it took to get medical aide, at the very least a hospital plan. Never wants to go through that again.

 

[AniV]

Another horror story as relayed by a paramedic from a state ambulance: a teenage girl was in a bad car accident and was taken to Chris Hani Baragwanath.
When the paramedics dropped her off, she was parked in a corridor and left there. When the paramedics returned three hours later with another patient, she was still lying in the same spot in the corridor.

The difference? She'd been gang-raped twice.
She still hadn't been admitted.

 

[Alestorm]

Another horror story as relayed by a paramedic from a state ambulance: a teenage girl was in a bad car accident and was taken to Chris Hani Baragwanath.
When the paramedics dropped her off, she was parked in a corridor and left there. When the paramedics returned three hours later with another patient, she was still lying in the same spot in the corridor.

The difference? She'd been gang-raped twice.
She still hadn't been admitted.

You sure this is real.. who can/does gang rape a girl in such a state in the middle of a hospital? Sounds next to impossible in a crowded hospital.

Another +1 for my closest state hospitals though, Victoria and Groote Schuur. Lucky to have those two close by.

 

[Brawler]

The Cape Town state hospitals (and even Clinics & PHC's) aren't as bad as the rest of ZA.

 

[satanboy]

Anything that has to do with the state is Krap. end of story.

I love SARS...very efficient...so you have it wrong.


I knew a guy that had FULL medical aid (one of the top of the line Discovery packages) that sat in queues like that (because the doctor there had his file!).

 

[genetic]

Another horror story as relayed by a paramedic from a state ambulance: a teenage girl was in a bad car accident and was taken to Chris Hani Baragwanath.
When the paramedics dropped her off, she was parked in a corridor and left there. When the paramedics returned three hours later with another patient, she was still lying in the same spot in the corridor.

The difference? She'd been gang-raped twice.
She still hadn't been admitted.

I call this BS.

 

[DigitalSoldier]

Try the hospitals here in Gauteng, my wife before her medical aid kicked in was sent to Helen Joseph for her appendix, we arrived just before 6am, I left that night at midnight having had her just booked in. They only operated on her the next day at 3pm.

Agreed. Gauteng state hospitals are a mess wouldn't go near one here in gp. There was a story recently about a patient in gp that died while waiting for results.





Sent from my HTC Desire using MyBroadband Android App