Patients on floors moved into wards as Chituwo tours UTH
Patients on floors moved into wards as Chituwo tours UTH
By Agness Changala and Moses Kuwema
Thu 09 Sep. 2010, 04:04 CAT
UNIVERSITY Teaching Hospital (UTH) management has moved out the patients that were sleeping on the floor in the hospital wards.
This move follows a story and pictures that were published last week on Sunday, which depicted the desperate situation at the hospital where patients were found lying on the floor.
An on-the-spot check at the Filter Clinic and D block ward where the pictures were taken revealed that the floors were free of patients and no mattresses was found in the corridors.
Acting health minister Dr Brian Chituwo toured the Filter Clinic and other wards at the hospital.
Dr Chituwo said his presence at the hospital was not planned, but he merely passed through on his way to the office to interact with the members of staff.
After the tour, Dr Chituwo said the government had finished upgrading clinics around Lusaka and that UTH would be decongested once these clinics are commissioned.
“We don’t believe as a health institution we have anything to hide, we are going to fix the problem with management at UTH and if it would be beyond them, there are linkages with the Ministry of Health headquarters that can be ventured into in addressing this problem,” said Dr Chituwo who is science and technology minister.
UTH acting managing director Dr Luckson Kasonka explained that the congestion was created by the nurses who transferred patients to the admission wards every two hours instead of 30 minutes.
Dr Kasonka said in future the hospital would work towards having two or more nurses tasked to take the patients to admission wards so that the Filter Clinic is left free.
However, Dr Kasonka said it was difficult to de-congest the place completely because a lot of patients needed to be attended to at once even with the shortage of manpower.
But sources talked to before Dr Chituwo’s visit said the story and pictures that were published in The Post prompted the minister to visit the institution.
They said the order that was seen yesterday at UTH was temporary and they commended The Post for bringing it out the problem.
“Although some people were in trouble after that story came out, it is good. You people are doing a commendable job but we know this won’t last because very soon, it will get back to congestion,” one of the sources said.
They explained that the sister-in- charge, who was on duty that day, was accused of wilfully allowing the media to take pictures of the congestion at the wards.
Meanwhile, Dr Chituwo said people should not judge the failure or success of mobile hospitals before they see the benefits.
He argued that the government’s decision was aimed at reaching people who could not access services in health centres located several kilometres away from their homes.
Dr Chituwo said the government should only be challenged after the initiative fails.
He further observed that the fertility rate in the country was very high especially in the rural areas.
Dr Chituwo said as a result of the high fertility rate, the dependency population had also increased.
“For instance in rural areas you will find a young girl with a pregnancy or a baby behind her back, this creates high dependency levels and when you have a high dependency population then you have a problem,” Dr Chituwo said.
He said in rural areas people did not only have one wife but three and each of the wives could have as many as five children.
Dr Chituwo said the high fertility rate added more agony in the provision of heath care in the country.
[Brian Chituwo couldn't find his behind with both hands if the population of Zambia was 6 million, instead of 12 million. Blaming population growth is the last refuge of the incompetent and the retarded. There is money in the mines, go and get it. And stop blaming outside factors, like demographics. - MrK]
Labels: BRIAN CHITUWO, HEALTHCARE, STUPIDITY, UTH
posted by MrK @ 7:10 AM
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