09 OCTOBER 2020, Friday
Program Director, today we are indeed excited as this is one project that will not just change the lives of the community but will also positively impact on our quest to attain a long and healthy life for all our people.
Our enthusiasm for this project is borne out of our commitment to deliver quality health service.The same commitment that we have displayed as a province in the fight against COVID-19 pandemic. I can report to this gathering that as a province to-date we have recorded 27 914 (27 925 reported by ministers with 11 misallocations) confirmed cases of COVID-19, contributing 4% to the total number of cases in the country that are standing at 686 891.
It is encouraging to us to report that 26 698 of the total confirmed cases has since recovered, making the province to record the recovery rate of 96% which is higher than the national recovery rate that is standing at 90%.
Gert Sibande District is the second highest contributor to the provincial cases following Nkangala District with 9039 confirmed cases. In the main we are aware that Goven Mbeki was the epicentre of the district and contributed 3655 positive cases to the cases of Gert Sibande District and Msuka.ligwa has recorded 1642 positive cases with 1556 of them already recovered.
It is with heavy hearts to also note that as province we lost 583 people to the pandemic of which 246 were from Gert Sibande and 47 were specifically from Msukaligwa, may their soul rest in peace. None the less we are not going to despair or be discouraged we are going to continue to be in this battle until we overcome it.
We are currently planning to be able to manage the possible resurge and we can only be able to conquer if we continue to work together
In 2018, the Mpumalanga Department of Health and WITS Faculty of Health Sciences signed a Memorandum of Understanding, committing to a progressive partnership for improved health services.
One of the clinical priorities within this MOU is the provision of Radiology Services in the province.
In addition, this partnership seeks to support health systems development, the recruitment and development of health professionals, capacity building programmes, creating opportunities for the sharing of resources, promoting innovation, excellence and exchange of knowledge in health service delivery and creating the opportunity to develop multi-disciplinary Clinical Centres of Excellence.
The Mpumalanga Department of Health through this partnership with WITS, has embarked on a partnership aimed at providing Radiology Services to two Tertiary hospitals (Rob Ferreira Hospital and Witbank Hospital) and two Regional hospitals (Ermelo Hospital and Themba Hospital) in the province.
Currently Mapulaneng hospital is the only regional hospital not having a CT-Scan machine due to infrastructure limitations, but this will be addressed in the new hospital under construction.
The launch of the Radiology Services project today marks another milestone in this partnership, the first was the Oncology Services at Rob Ferreira Hospital that has been running for over a year now, providing the much needed service to the people of Mpumalanga.
The partnership celebrated today, is the provision of Radiology services in two tertiary hospitals (Rob Ferreira and Witbank Hospitals) and two regional hospitals (Ermelo and Themba Hospitals) in Mpumalanga Province.
The main objective of this Radiology initiative is to provide a 24-hour radiology services to the four hospitals in line with the regional hospital services package and tertiary hospital services package.
To replace the historical arrangement of sending patient records for reporting by radiologists outside the hospitals, we have introduced internal capacity for radiological reporting within the four hospitals. The four hospitals are linked and can access reports remotely.
The deployment of the Radiologists started on the 1st April 2020. For the first time in the Department, each of the four hospitals have a Radiologist onsite five days a week and our clinicians have a Radiologist on call, 24-hours, for clinical advice and tele-reporting after-hours, on weekends and holidays. This has resulted in improved turnaround times for radiology reports – which has led to expedited treatment of patients and possibly, reduced unnecessary admissions, or referrals in the four hospitals.
As the ANC led government, we have taken a decision to establish improved access to specialized services in the province and as such return the dignity to our people, who struggle every day to access specialized tertiary services.
Working together in partnership with WITS University we will drive the change that our people need in terms of specialized service through continual learning, creative thinking and a collective desire to positively impact the lives of every person accessing our public health facilities.
It is of utmost importance for Mpumalanga province to establish optimal radiology services and other specialised services in the province in order:
- To minimise the province’s dependency on Gauteng province as this further retards the province’s ability to carry its mandate to provide comprehensive services to the people of Mpumalanga
- To reduce referrals to Steve Biko Hospital -this will especially, offer relief to very sick patients who have to travel for hours to access the services of Radiologists and other specialities.
The single view of complete outsourcing of all the Radiology services is not favourable to the province as this will leave the department poorer after the end of the contract with no capacity to continue with the services and this is an undesirable outcome.
Allow me to take this opportunity to acknowledge the joint effort by the Department and WITS University to ensure that Radiology services are up and running, the Radiology Teams in the four hospitals who played a pivotal role to make sure we realize this initiative led by the HOD and Prof Wezile Chitha.
Lastly, we all need to appreciate that solutions we are planning, working on and implementing are those that must address health in its totality in accordance with the World Health Organization (WHO) definition that says: “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well- being, and not merely the absence of diseases or infirmity.’
I Thank you
Ha khensa
Siyabonga
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