Residents block access to Kwazakhele Clinic over staff shortages

The Herald

3 days ago

A shortage of staff at the Kwazakhele Clinic puts the lives of patients, who have to line up outside the facility from 5am hoping to get assistance, in danger and exposes them to the risk of getting mugged.
On Monday, frustrated residents shut down access to the clinic and burned tyres outside the gate in protest against the Eastern Cape health department's failure to fill vacant positions.
The clinic, which caters for a vast section of the community, has had no operations manager after the previous person retired in 2023.
It only has one pharmacist assistant, a general worker and eight nurses.
Residents gathered outside the clinic again on Tuesday to block entry.
Public order police cleared the road and remove the burnt debris.
Some nurses and health department officials were meant to meet inside, along with the clinic committee, to iron out issues.
Health department district health services chief director Sindiswa Gede requested that the meeting take place behind closed doors, however, it caused further tension, with residents refusing to be left out.
Speaking on behalf of the community, Lwando Mange said they often had to stand guard early in the morning to ensure those queuing were not attacked by criminals.
'Our main problem is the slow pace of assisting patients due to the shortage of staff.
'This is such a huge facility which caters for several areas of the community, yet there are only eight nurses.
'They often can't take leave and one person's absence is felt and residents have to wait longer for the service.'
Mange said the clinic was often dirty because the general worker had to clean all areas including the toilets.
'It gets dirty easily and when she goes on leave it becomes a big hygiene problem.
'People who fetch chronic treatment suffer the most.
'They have to get up early to leave their treatment cards and are told to return after three days to get medication because the only pharmacist assistant available can't do all the work alone.'
This includes packing the medication when orders arrive and dispensing it to hundreds of people.
'It's truly sad, especially for patients who get their ARVs [antiretroviral] because they need their treatment daily and don't have three days to wait until they get helped, and the same nurses scold them for defaulting.'
Addressing the community, Gede said health department boss Rolene Wagner had met union representatives on June 27 in a bid to resolve the staffing issues.
Gede said they were busy with a verification process to check all 48 clinics in Nelson Mandela Bay.
'This clinic now has eight professional nurses, which means it meets the requirements to operate, but the most pressing issue here is that there is only one general worker.
'We will get a report on all facilities in this district including the mobile clinics and outreach services, which will indicate which facilities have more staff than required and we will move them to where there is a shortage.'
Gede said the shortage of staff was a problem across the city and they were looking at the department's budget to check if there was money to appoint more people.
Clinic committee secretary Nolusindiso Magida said they had written numerous letters and made calls to officials to address the issues.
'Every time a nurse is transferred to a different facility we would call and inquire when a replacement will be brought and we never get a definite answer.
'We used to have about 16 nurses here and a manager but as things stand they have requested one of the nurses to act in that position which means there's one nurse short.
'We didn't close the clinic because we are ungovernable, we wanted to be heard by the relevant people so that community members are serviced efficiently.'
Ward 17 councillor Gamalihleli Maqula said while he understood the plight of the residents, he was against the closure of the clinic.
'You can't chase people away because you have a grievance, what about the sickly people who desperately need their medication.
'The health district is dealing with the staff shortages which really is a problem but there's no need to suspend the services even for those who need them the most.'
The Herald