676 Patients wait for Ops at Steve Biko Hospital

18 July 2016

676 patients are on the waiting lists for operations at the Steve Biko Academic Hospital in Pretoria, some for as long as two years.

This is revealed by Gauteng Health MEC Qedani Mahlangu in a written reply to my questions in the Gauteng Legislature.

The breakdown of the waiting lists is as follows:

Hip surgery - 268 patients

Knee surgery - 212 patients

Spinal surgery - 92 patients

General surgery - 80 patients

Waiting times are as follows:

Orthopaedics - 18 to 24 months

General surgery - 8 to 12 months

Cardiothoracic - 2 weeks

According to Mahlangu, the long waiting lists are "a direct result of the huge demand for patient services ... from as far as Limpopo and North West Province to access the highly specialized services available in this hospital."

Other reasons include:

- the current surge of serious trauma cases "pushes out" planned elective surgical operations

- a significant number of patient referrals that should have been operated at other tertiary hospitals in the SBAH cluster

- the demand for joint replacement surgery has increased with the increase in the aged population suffering from arthritis

The other big issue is the high number of cancelled operations - last year, 680 operations were cancelled or deferred because of facility issues, emergency cases, patient-related or a shortage of ICU beds.

Special measures should be taken to cut the unacceptably long waiting time for knee and hip operations.

Other hospitals in the area should also be assisted to do more operations so as to ease the high surgery load at Steve Biko Hospital.

Issued by Jack Bloom, DA Gauteng Shadow MEC for Healthy, 18 July 2016