Mahikeng Hospital has received 18 incubators after images surfaced on social media showing newborn babies in the neonatal ward sleeping in cardboard boxes instead of incubators or cribs.
Staff say there has long been a shortage of both, and that despite protestations and claims of ignorance, management was well aware of this.
The Human Rights Commission (HRC) has opened an investigation into the resources blunder, its North West manager, Shirley Mlombo, said, according to TimesLIVE.
Denosa North West deputy chairperson Mzwakhe Seleke said the union raised resources constraints at Mahikeng Provincial Hospital with management six months before nurses ran out of equipment in the neonatal unit.
“The babies issue is the tip of the iceberg. There are serious issues in the hospital, including electricity. On Monday we had about four wards dark, without electricity.
“There are deep issues of failures of management and (they) are evident, nobody can hide them,” he said.
He said the nurses on duty at the time had delivered 56 babies and had no choice but to use boxes to avoid newborns sleeping on the floor.
“The capacity of beds in that ward is 25, the nurses delivered 56 babies and tried to borrow from other facilities but only managed to get 43. They could not do anything else and could not let the newborns sleep on the floor. They had to make a plan,” Seleke said.
Seleke said no nurses have been suspended over the incident.
North West Health Department spokesperson Tebogo Lekgethwane told TimesLIVE there were no health complications with the babies placed in boxes, adding they were all in good health.
Lekgethwane said Health MEC Madoda Sambatha was not aware of the resources constraints despite Denosa saying this was raised with management months ago.
“It is only at the meeting with the unions on Monday that the unions stated the shortage of equipment at the neonatal unit was long raised with management. That meeting resolved to wait for the preliminary report of the investigation which the MEC will share today (Wednesday),” she said.
Lekgethwane said hospital management told the department they were not informed by the nurses of the decision to use cardboard boxes and claimed they could have intervened.
On Tuesday, Sambatha conceded there were space challenges in the hospital.
“The hospital will be expanded with an additional 100 beds. As part of increasing space in the facility, management started engaging the provincial infrastructure [department] to procure a park home which will provide space for [the] neonatal unit,” the MEC said.
However, reports News24, the Democratic Nursing Organisation of South Africa’s (Denosa) provincial secretary Reuben Molete said the matter didn’t need any investigation because a daily reality faced by staff in hospitals and clinics was the shortage of equipment.
He said it was an attempt to throw burdened health workers under the bus and pass the blame.
“The only investigation needed is why it has taken this long for the procurement of these essential incubators and cribs, when indications of their urgent need was made a long time ago.
“As a matter of context, the neonatal intensive care unit has been short of 20 incubators and cribs for an extended period. The unit has 25 incubators, but had more than 55 babies on the day in question, who were being looked after by only seven nurses.
“Denosa would like to see North West MEC Madoda Sambatha focusing on those who are supposed to ensure the incubators and cribs are procured, which are not the nurses – that is not their function.”
Sambatha had expressed shock after the images emerged on social media showing the babies sleeping in cardboard boxes, reports TimesLIVE.
The union said as Mahikeng provides the highest level of care in the Ngaka Modiri Molema district, the only options available to staff in such situations are to turn away patients, keep them in an inappropriate unit, or refer them to facilities of equal level of care – which are two hours away.
Meanwhile, the department has placed the nursing manager of the neonatal section under precautionary suspension for failing to report the shortage of incubators.
According to hospital management, a preliminary internal investigation revealed the incident had happened on Saturday and they had not been alerted, reports TimesLIVE.
Systems and procedures should have guided the hospital on how to deal with a shortage of incubators, Sambatha had said.
TimesLIVE– SAHRC to investigate North West hospital's babies in boxes debacle
SAHRC to investigate North West hospital's babies in boxes debacle
See more from MedicalBrief archives:
Porter suspended following North West hospital mortuary debacle
SA’s sick hospitals: Dysfunction in Bloem, limping along in Mahikeng
Mahikeng doctor defies strike violence to deliver babies
North West hospital’s patients go vegetarian as money runs out