Africa-Press – Botswana. Ministry of Health has introduced some strategies to help alleviate shortage of doctors and specialists as well as reduce the long waiting periods of patients. Answering a question in Parliament on Tuesday, Minister of Health, Dr Stephen Modise said the ministry was working with the Directorate of Public Service Management on improving working conditions for doctors in order to retain them.
He also there were also plans to open Sir Ketumile Masire Teaching Hospital to the public, adding this would help in training specialists in the country.
Dr Modise further said they had taken a decision to re-invent primary health care in an effort to reduce the need for specialist services.
He further said they faced medical shortages due to budgetary constraints and cash flow issues.
In addition, he said they had resorted to pool medical procurement with other SADC countries and also procuring directly with the manufacturers.
Meanwhile, Dr Modise, who admitted that the ministry was aware of shortage of staff and specialists at Selebi Phikwe, said the ministry had already deployed Cuban specialists to the hospital.
He also revealed that there were nine medical doctors and two medical specialists stationed in Selebi Phikwe as well as a paediatrician and family physician.
Dr Modise said the hospital needed 14 doctors, one paediatrician, one internal medicine specialist, general surgeon, gynaecologist, anaesthetist and an ophthalmologist.
He said the country was faced with shortage of these specialists but they would be deployed to Selebi Phikwe once they become available.
The minister noted that the Selebi Phikwe Hospital had a bed capacity of 65 adding that most of the patients slept in porta cabins due to shortage of working space.
He said the ministry had planned to extend the hospital during the National Transition Development Plan 2023 to 2025.
The minister said the scope of the work, which was awarded through Development Model (DM), entailed general refurbishment and increase of beds to 128.
He said additionally, the scope would enable the extension of specialist services such as medical, surgical, paediatric and expanded maternity services.
Dr Modise said the scope also included a new lab, accident and emergency department and a new administration building.
He said the project, which was at design stage, was however stopped pending the review of the DM model by government, adding further that the Ministry of Finance had advised on cost cutting measures due to budgetary constraints.
The minister was responding to a question posed by Selebi Phikwe West MP, Mr Reuben Kaizer, who had asked the minister if he was aware that Selebi Phikwe Hospital faced challenges of shortage of doctors, specialists, medicine and inadequate facilities.
He also asked the minister to state how he planned to rectify the situation and to state the number of doctors and specialists working there and the number required looking at the number of patients.
MP Kaizer also asked if there were any plans to build a new hospital or upgraded the existing one into a fully-fledged specialised hospital.
Source: dailynews
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