Helen Joseph Hospital in the west of Johannesburg, has been plagued by a shortage of clean linen for the whole of July.
Democratic Alliance (DA) Gauteng Shadow MEC for Health Jack Bloom said, “On July 23, about 25 operations were cancelled because of the linen shortage.
“Ten more surgery cases were cancelled on July 27 for the same reason.
“More than 20 operations were cancelled on July 16 and there was also disruption of surgery on July 7 and 14.
“Theatre staff are at their wits end with all the cancellations because of something that should be easy to fix.
“It is very distressing to tell patients that operations have to be deferred, especially with long waiting lists, which can be as long as three years for a hip operation,” he said.
Bloom said the linen problem is caused by erratic supply from the laundry at the Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Hospital which is unreliable because of a broken boiler.
“This linen crisis cannot be allowed to continue.
“Hospital management should be allowed to use private laundries which are cheaper and more efficient than dysfunctional state laundries,” said Bloom.
“In the past two weeks, Helen Joseph Hospital has had 505 booked operations,” Helen Joseph Hospital communications officer Mathapelo Nhlapo, said.
Nhlapo said within these booked operations only 127 were cancelled.
“Of the 127 only a minimum of three operations were cancelled due to linen shortages.”
“Furthermore, various reasons contribute to operation cancellations, such as patients health conditions and patients postponements or refusal,” she said.
