Marina�s self-referral ban yields results
Nnasaretha Kgamanyane | Wednesday November 8, 2017 13:38
According to the hospital’s chief communications and public relations officer Donnell Kutlapye, the hospital has seen a decline in maternity patients. This turnaround was observed since the Ministry of Health and Wellness took a decision that all first-time expectant women and mothers of up to four successful pregnancies deliver their babies at clinics with maternity wards.
“From the baseline of 576 deliveries at PMH when the exercise started in August, the hospital now delivers about 422 pregnant women a month. This has resulted to zero floor beds in most of maternity wing units. During the same era, the Greater Gaborone DHMT clinics currently deliver 271 women a month compared to the baseline number of 171,” he said.
Kutlapye added that PMH had also recorded a low number of self-referrals from villages near the capital city like Ramotswa, Thamaga, Mochudi, Molepolole and Modipane among others.
He explained that this shows Batswana have heeded the plea by health personnel to use clinics and said they were grateful for their cooperation. Kutlapye added that the decongestion team would continue monitoring the situation and give support visits to the Greater Gaborone clinics.
The move to decongest PMH maternity wing was taken because the hospital was overcrowded and as a result patient care was sometimes compromised. Recently, Kutlapye noted that the process did not mean that the hospital would be completely closing its maternity services. He explained that the hospital would continue giving maternity services to expectant mothers. However, Kutlapye explained that they would be attending pregnant women who have been referred to the hospital by the different clinics.
Kutlapye explained that during pregnancy, the midwives would have been doing extensive assessment throughtout the pregnancy so that they could be able to detect if there are complications at an early stage.
“We have observed that the congestion of the hospital is made by self-referrals. Many people come to the hospital when they could be getting the same services from the nearest clinics and as a result contributing to the workload and congestion of the maternity and other wards.
“We will be attending pregnant women who have been referred here by their doctors.
Most of the referrals may be caused by complications that can put the mother or child’s lives at risk. We will also be attending patients with cardiac issues as long as they are referred by their doctors,” he said.