Specialised health care bill prohibitive
Baboki Kayawe | Tuesday December 13, 2016 15:50
A number of external partners, as well as the two local private hospitals are owed an undisclosed amount of monies for rendering specialised services such as complicated oncology procedures and paediatric morphology (renal diseases) and children related ailments, Mmegi learnt yesterday.
Health minister, Dorcas Makgato said they have been able to freeze out some finances to pay, but she divulged that as of last week the situation was bad. Addressing the media on the state of her ministry, she added, “this ministry stresses me, I have to make judgement calls, life and death decisions”. “The ministry is currently working on reducing escalating cost of referral to South Africa and local private facilities at the same time improving access to specialist care,” she said. However, the minister declined to disclose the amount of the costs the government has incurred in referrals.
Part of the strategy is the establishment of a managed care unit to strengthen monitoring and evaluation of clinical care, for hospitalised patients as well as monitoring specialists’ need and distribution in the country. The core function of this unit would be managing the cost of patients’ stay at these facilities, accommodation as well as the nature of treatment regimes rendered. In addition, local facilities are being capacitated to handle specialised care as in the case of Scottish Livingstone Hospital in Molepolole being prepared for cardiology services, Baylor Children’s Clinic to render paediatric morphology, as well as the proposed radiology centre, explained permanent secretary Shenaaz El-Halabi.
Moreover, the ministry has started, in a phased approach, to strengthen adult and neonatal Intensive Care Units in upgraded district hospitals like Mahalapye and Scottish Livingstone Hospitals. “We are also procuring specialists equipment and modifying structures to accommodate the current specialists that we now have in our facilities, for instance gastroenterology,” said Makgato. Gastroenterology is a field of medicine specialising in the diagnosis and treatment of all problems of the digestive system. Moreover, gynaecology specialists, who will be working with midwives, are being assigned to clustered districts to improve maternal health, the minister said.
Mmegi also learnt efforts are underway to operationalise the Botswana Public Health Institute next year, tasked with specialised public health surveillance, to serve as a public health emergency operation centre as well as quaternary referral laboratory.
In efforts to decongest the two main referral hospitals- Princess Marina and Nyangabwe, all maternity clinics have been equipped for maternal and neonatal care and have had staff capacitated, further explained Makgato.
“Low risk expectant mothers are being re-directed from Princess Marina Hospital to Gaborone maternity clinics on a daily basis,” she said.