The City of Joburg is addressing the challenge of long queues at primary healthcare facilities.
Executive Mayor Clr Parks Tau launched an e-health system on Wednesday.
The introduction of the electronic system is a response to concerns that were raised by residents, who left their homes as early as 4am to be in front of the queue at the City’s primary healthcare facilities.
“With this new system we will drastically reduce long queues and the piles of paper at the clinics will be replaced by a multi-million-Rand, 21st century electronic patient processing system,” said Clr Tau.
The City conducted a survey that found that people had an issue with spending the whole day stuck in a queue.
“The City had to find a solution to ensure that people didn’t wake up at dawn to queue and that they receive quality healthcare services. Healthcare professionals also used to spend more time doing paperwork and less time attending to the real issues of the patients,” said Clr Tau.
The mayor said that, for Johannesburg, being a smart city meant being able to meet the needs of the people.
“It’s about delivering services where they are needed the most and dealing with the issues that matter the most. The new system meant Johannesburg residents had leapfrogged into the digital era. We as the City of Johannesburg are using technology to solve the problems that residents face.
“This system will keep records safe and minimise room for error and avoid unnecessary mistakes,” said Clr Tau.
Member of the Mayoral Committee for Health and Social Development, Clr Nonceba Molwele said the City was doing all that was necessary to improve the quality of services it provides.
The system will be rolled out to the rest of public clinics in Johannesburg in due course.
