Shortage of healthcare professionals poses serious problems
Lesedi Mkhutshwa | Wednesday July 2, 2025 06:01
Botswana has been facing a shortage of doctors responding to emergency duties, which has caused concern. Principal District Development Officer and committee secretary, Masego Pitso, said they have severe shortages of nurses, doctors and laboratory personnel.
She said when citing the Urban Development Committee (UDC) report.
According to Pitso, they now have 17 doctors, up from 16 in the quarter before.
She stated that the doctors attend 12 of the 16 medical facilities each week, including 24-hour clinics.
Pitso disclosed that although there are currently 507 nurses, there should be 596, with 55 medical officers instead of 90.
'We need 40 specialists, but we right now have 16. Currently, there are 65 laboratory scientists compared to 55. We have a serious staffing shortage, as the statistics demonstrate,' she added. She mentioned that the CT scanner was being repaired. Pitso also said that they are having problems with theatre temperature and HIV testing kit shortages.
She added that they are outsourcing surgeries to private facilities. Last year, Nyangabgwe Referral Hospital (NRH) superintendent, Dr Ivan Kgetsi, said the medical facility is overburdened with a heavy workload due to the large number of outpatients.
Speaking on the hospital's annual performance, he indicated that in 2023, the NRH recorded close to 42,000 inpatients and about 91,680 outpatients from different outpatient clinics.
He also highlighted that they registered about 17,500 patients at accidents and emergency services, and 12,088 patients at the dental unit, which could be presumed a small number but is not.
He added that they admit referrals from clinics in Francistown and even in neighbouring villages, which are under the Greater Francistown District Health Management Team.