Patients have complained of waiting for long periods to receive assistance at Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital. File Picture: Independent Newspapers Archives
Durban: Patients have raised serious concerns about the long waiting times to receive healthcare services at Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Hospital (MGMH) and the Phoenix Community Health Centre (PCHC).
The patients, who spoke to The Mercury on condition of anonymity, said there were severe staff shortages, overcrowding of patients, and inadequate medical care.
The health department has recently been in the spotlight over claims that there were medication shortages at healthcare facilities.
However the department produced a report last week which indicated that there were no shortages.
Dr Jonathan Annipen, an IFP councillor in the eThekwini Municipality, wrote to KwaZulu-Natal Legislature Speaker Nontembeko Boyce, highlighting severe issues at both facilities last week.
Annipen said there was a critical shortage of doctors and nurses, which has created “chaos” and led to frustration among staff and patients alike.
“The PCHC requires a complete overhaul of management. Under the current leadership, the centre will soon need to be shut down,” he said, adding that there is no clear management structure and that staff appear “overworked and frustrated.”
One frustrated patient, who visited the hospital on Tuesday last week, said patients have to wait for days to receive care.
“About 80 patients have not been seen since yesterday; I haven’t received treatment in 24 hours,” he said at the time.
He later confirmed that he was attended to only on Thursday, after making several trips to the hospital and enduring long hours of waiting.
Another patient, who said it took two days to receive assistance in MGMH’s Room 1, reported: “There is a significant backlog, with only one doctor attending to patients. Many of us are experiencing long wait times, hunger, and fatigue.”
Imraan Keeka, Chairperson of the Health Portfolio Committee in the KZN Legislature and DA spokesperson on health, confirmed that numerous complaints have been received.
“We didn’t wait for these correspondences to reach us. We had already engaged with the CEO (MGMH) of that facility as early as November last year,” Keeka said.
He acknowledged widespread issues, including infrastructure problems, bed shortages, long waiting times, and a lack of medicine and doctors.
“These issues are not limited to this facility but reflect a broader problem across eThekwini.”
Keeka noted that while some improvements are underway, such as the repair of a collapsing roof, many problems persist due to budgetary constraints.
The KZN Health Department had not responded by the time of publication to questions sent last week.
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