20 000 patients harmed in Gauteng hospitals

6 August 2018

More than 20 000 patients have been harmed by negligence in Gauteng state hospitals in the last two-and-a-half years.

This is revealed by Gauteng Health MEC Gwen Ramokgopa in a written reply to my questions in the Gauteng Legislature on Serious Adverse Events (SAEs), which are defined as an event that results in an unintended harm to the patient by an act of commission or omission rather than by the underlying disease or condition of the patient.

According to Ramokgopa, the SAEs included “allegations of negligence, incompetence of staff members, human errors, abscondment of patients and system failure”.

There is a total of 20 417 SAEs recorded from 2016 to date as follows:

2016 - 6192
2017 - 9767
2018 up to June - 4458

The Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital is the most dangerous hospital for patients in Gauteng, with 4320 recorded SAEs over this period.

The other academic hospitals had the following number of SAEs:

Steve Biko Hospital - 1789
George Mukhari Hospital - 1574
Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Hospital - 1262

The worst SAE numbers in other hospitals are as follows:

Sebokeng Hospital - 1487
Thelle Mogoerane Hospital - 1387
Helen Joseph Hospital - 1044
Tembisa Hospital - 865
Rahima Moosa Hospital - 860
Mamelodi Hospital - 824
Leratong Hospital - 651
Far East Rand Hospital - 644
Tambo Memorial Hospital - 615
Kalafong Hospital - 413
Pholosong Hospital - 384
Bertha Gxowa Hospital - 323

Heidelberg Hospital had the lowest number of SAEs (42), followed by Tshwane District (50), Pretoria West (66), Odi (77), Carletonville (90) and South Rand (92).

Ramokgopa says that action taken after SAEs includes discipline, referral to the police, and referrals to the Health Professions Council and the SA Nursing Council, as well as various preventative measures to minimize SAEs.

The shockingly high number of harmful events to patients highlights the crisis in public health that is driving up medical negligence cases which lead to huge court-ordered payouts.

The Democratic Alliance calls for effective measures to minimize medical mistakes that are mostly caused by poor management and lack of consequences for negligence.

Issued by Jack Bloom, DA Gauteng Shadow Health MEC, 6 August 2018