Healthcare crisis: TMH is battling to keep up with rising demand
A spokesperson for the hospital told this publication that its neonatal intensive care unit often reaches capacity.
In response to the service delivery protest led by Rise Mzansi outside the Tambo Memorial Hospital (TMH), hospital management pointed out that the facility was simply not designed and equipped to cope with the current population, which has placed a significant burden on healthcare facilities across the region.
In light of the ‘dwindling’ resources and services at hospitals across the country, members of RISE Mzansi descended on Tambo Memorial Hospital (TMH) on December 6 and staged a protest demanding that the healthcare centre be equipped with adequate resources to be able to provide the level of care South Africans deserve.
TMH spokesperson Zoliswa Nzeku said as a result of the soaring rate of population growth, the hospital has with the available resources been battling to cope with increasing demands for health services or hospital care.
“Tambo Memorial Hospital is one of the oldest hospitals in Gauteng. Unfortunately, the infrastructure of the hospital was built to serve a much smaller number of people than what it has to deal with currently. Over the years, Gauteng province has seen an increase in the population, which is at a faster rate than what our facility can handle,” explained Nzeku.
“As a result, there is a challenge with neonatal beds. Therefore, the hospital ends up having to manage a ward that is over 100% capacity because there is nowhere else to take the patients, due to other hospitals also being facing the same plight.
“It is worth noting that each case of the alleged deaths, injuries and trauma will be dealt with individually as presented. Unfortunately, the generalisation does not take into consideration the varying patient factors.”
On the other hand, Rise Mzansi management maintains that while it is true that the health service is facing a race against a rapidly growing population, the current government lacks the will to identify efficient strategies to resolve the challenges at hand, and to create a stronger health system for the healthcare facilities to cope with the growing demand.
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