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PATIENTS FORCED TO QUEUE ALL NIGHT TO SEE DOCTOR

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MBABANE – Patients suffering from bone-related illnesses are forced to spend the night in the open as they queue to see a doctor, once a week, at the Mbabane Government Hospital.

The patients can only access medical care for their illnesses only once a week due to a shortage of orthopaedic surgeons in the employ of the Ministry of Health, which has resulted in these patients queuing overnight at the Mbabane Government Hospital.

Given the high demand for the services of an orthopaedic against the limited human resource, the patients in need of a bone specialist spend the night sleeping on the floor along the passage at the hospital. 

It was gathered that the patients who suffered from bone complications were attended to by only one surgeon at the hospital’s Orthopaedic Clinic. 

Surgeon 

The surgeon reportedly attends to only 50 patients once a week. This was said to have resulted in some patients camping along the corridors of the hospital so that they could be among the 50 who are attended to on Thursdays. 

According to impeccable sources, the patients’ conditions deteriorated as they spent the night in the open. 

This publication engaged one of the people who have endured the cold nights along the hospitals corridors.

*Thobile said she normally accompanied her elderly mother to the hospital. During these trips, she said in the past her mother had been turned back from the hospital after the 50 tickets had been issued for the patients to be seen by the doctor that week.

 Thobile said there was an instance where they were turned back despite having arrived at the hospital as early as 6am. 

Queuing 

As a result, she claimed that in recent months, they started queuing on the night before (Wednesday), from around 10pm until they were attended to when the doctor arrived at 8am the following day. 

According to Thobile, some patients came from as far as Lomahasha to seek assistance from the hospital as most of them could not afford to get services at private hospitals.

Director of Health Services Dr Vusi Magagula confirmed that there was indeed a shortage of orthopaedic surgeons in the country. He said currently there were not enough health practitioners in the country.  

He said there was currently only one orthopaedic surgeon at the Mbabane Government Hospital, who could only attend to a few patients in a day. 

When asked why there was only one surgeon at the hospital, he said the practising surgeon was a liSwati and that he could seek greener pastures.

Magagula went on to say this did not affect the Mbabane Government Hospital only but also other health institutions in the country.

However, he said this did not mean that the patients were not important but stated that this owed to the shortage of health workers, particularly orthopaedic surgeons, countrywide.

Worth noting is that in recent years, there has been an exodus of medical personnel who sought greener pastures in First World countries. 

This resulted in a shortage of the medical practitioners; mostly those who were rendering specialised services.

The doctors complained about the remuneration they received from government and they were not happy with the manner in which government dealt with their on-call allowances.

At some point, the allowance was not paid to the medical practitioners for over a year while ordinarily they received it every six months. 

This allowance is paid to doctors for being on call 24 hours within the Mbabane Government Hospital. 

Following this, the doctors threatened to down their stethoscopes and not work beyond their stipulated hours.



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