18 Jun 2019

Health and wellness minister, Dr Alfred Madigele, has promised to find solutions to a maintenance challenge at Athlone hospital in Lobatse. Dr Madigele, accompanied by senior management from the ministry, toured facilities at the hospital on June 17.

He admitted that the hospital had not been refurbished for a long time and therefore required attention. He said the ministry would find ways of addressing the issue and also hinted at the possibility of relocating the hospital to the current site of Sbrana Psychiatric Hospital,. 

Regarding other challenges such as shortage of technical staff and drugs, Minister Madigele said close collaboration was required between the ministry’s headquarters and the district to address those issues.

“We need to really pay close attention through our team effort in the ministry to make sure that the sort of separation that has been apparent between the headquarters and the district is closed, to make sure that we meet all our promises of service delivery to the people in the district,” said the minister. 

He, however, congratulated the Athlone hospital staff for keeping the facility clean even though it had not undergone major maintenance for a long time.

“Athlone is very clean, despite all these challenges and you need to be applauded for that,” he said.

Dr Madigele explained that the ministry was in the process of organisational restructuring of leadership at district health management level as a way of improving delivery of health services.

He said the restructuring would see the District Health Management Team (DHMT) change to regional health authorities headed by officers at director level.

He said the regional authorities leadership would be able to make most key decisions on the spot.

“All those things would help us, even in terms of the supply chain management, which is a headache now.

 We would be able to have substantive people accountable in terms of supply chain, drug availability and commodities availability,” Dr Madigele said.

The hospital superintendent Dr Boipelo Lecoge, had earlier on stated that Athlone was facing challenges such as lack of maintenance to its facilities, shortage of medical officers, shortage of drugs as well as acute shortage of staff accommodation.  

“Our hospital is quite old and is dilapidated and in need of a lot of maintenance. 

It is quite difficult to maintain, you fix this today and tomorrow it is something else which requires maintenance,” said Dr Lecoge.

She asked for the hospital to be either thoroughly refurbished or rebuilt completely, adding that the situation was compounded by the fact that the hospital no longer had a facility management entity overseeing maintenance issues after the previous company had its contract terminated by the ministry.

She pointed out that drug availability in the last quarter was 74 per cent against the target of 97 per cent.  However, Dr Lecoge said availability of vital drugs remained satisfactory at the hospital.

“We also have a critical shortage of medical officers. Since 2017, ten medical officers left and only three have been replaced.

 Our doctors are overwhelmed. They try their best, but with the limited number that we have, we are struggling to keep up with the expectations from the community,” she said.

The ministry’s director of procurement, Dr Gilbert Matome, explained that scoping works were being carried out for refurbishment of Athlone hospital.  He said the refurbishment would overlap into the next financial year.  Concerning accommodation, Mr Matome said the ministry was building 19 staff houses in Lobatse, which were nearing completion.

He said though the houses were inadequate they would help to ease shortage of staff accommodation.

Boswelatlou councillor Mr Themba Stimela said the Lobatse community was angry about non refurbishment of Athlone hospital after several empty promises from government. 

 Mr Stimela expressed concern that Lobatse town council was told in the past that P480 million was available in the 2017/18 financial year for refurbishment of the hospital but nothing had happened.  ENDS