Friday, 26 May 2023

The North West Health MEC Madoda Sambatha has learnt with shock that new born babies who are patients in the neonatal section were placed in boxes instead of incubators or crib beds in Mahikeng Provincial hospital. The hospital management has indicated that their preliminary internal investigation has revealed that the incident happened on Saturday during the day and the management was not made aware about the incident.

The Department takes this matter on a serious light because there are systems, SOPs and procedures in place which should have guided the hospital on a solution if there were any challenges of shortage of incubators at the time. There are also management meetings that are held every Monday morning which normally looks into the weekend reports and yet this incident was never reported.

MEC Sambatha has directed that the matter should be speedily investigated. “The Department will institute further investigation to establish how much time was spent by these babies on these boxes. Under normal circumstances when staff members come across situations that are dire over the weekend they should call the managers so that relevant alternatives could be organised”, said MEC Sambatha

MEC Sambatha also said that as a matter of urgency arrangements are being made for additional cribs to be immediately sent to the hospital from a facility that has more and the CEO is following up on the procurement process which is underway in the hospital for additional incubators and cribs.

The Department unreservedly apologises for this incident and calls for calm while the matter is being investigated.

Enquiries:

Tebogo Lekgethwane Departmental Spokesperson 0674227763

Khuthala Tshangela MLO MEC Support 0664586915

Issued by

North West Department of Health