Poor response by Health MEC to patient death at Kalafong Hospital 

16 May 2017

I am disappointed at the poor response by Gauteng Health MEC Gwen Ramokgopa to the shocking treatment and death of Mrs Jeanette Shango (65) at the Kalafong Hospital.

According to lengthy correspondence which I presented to the MEC, Mrs Shango was misdiagnosed and sent from one junior doctor to another for two years.

She was subjected to delays, broken equipment and callous attitudes by medical staff and security guards.

On Wednesday 19 April this year Ms Lizette Jonker, who was Shango's employer and friend for many years, was told in an email from the hospital that "We visited Ms Shango yesterday with the Medical Manager. She says she doesn't have a problem presently as doctors are managing her well."

Ms Jonker then wrote back that Mrs Shango had been sent home before the Easter weekend and had died at home on Easter Monday night.

According to Jonker: "Mrs Shango was in the most excruciating pain, Kalafong sent her hospital with inadequate pain management and no hospice care. On Easter Monday night she started vomiting blood and was dead within the hour. I spoke to her twice on the phone that weekend and she was very weak. On Thursday night before Easter weekend after she was sent home I called her, she could barely speak."

MEC Ramokgopa said in an oral reply to my questions today that an investigation into this case was still taking place and that any negligent doctor would be reported to the SA Health Professions Council.

She said that Mrs Shango was supposed to have a MRI scan but the machine had been broken and she was given another date.

The medical manager and complaints officer now maintain that they had visited Shango on 12 April not 18 April, but this is contradicted by the correspondence with Jonker.

I am disappointed that the MEC did not express regret over this terrible case of mistreatment in a hospital that is notorious for poor health care.

This one case is of many that indicate that urgent measures are needed to improve the management at Kalafong Hospital.

Ramokgopa says that repair of the MRI has now been prioritized and the CEO's post was advertised on 30 April this year, with the deadline for applications on 12 May.

I hope that the new CEO has the skills and dynamism to radically improve patient care at this hospital.

Issued by Jack Bloom, DA Gauteng Shadow Health MEC, 16 May 2017