President Jacob Zuma has given a positive assessment of the Steve Biko Academic Hospital in Pretoria and reaffirmed government’s commitment to improve the country’s healthcare system to ensure that all citizens receive high-quality healthcare as one of government’s key priorities, says a CNBC Africa report. It says Zuma undertook a visit to the hospital, one of the well-managed and best-performing public hospitals in the country on 3 November 2017, in Pretoria to monitor the delivery of healthcare services as part of the Presidential Siyahlola Monitoring Programme.
The report says the visit by the president is part of the ongoing government monitoring programme that aims to address challenges facing public hospitals and to improve the healthcare system in the country. “We came here to see for ourselves one of the good stories of our country. I am very impressed and was even surprised by the great work done in this hospital by our scientists and medical staff as well as the positive response from the patients. I am also very happy with the manner in which this public hospital operates and how it is managed. Its outstanding performance highlights government’s commitment to provide high-quality healthcare to our people,” Zuma said.
“This hospital is the one of the best performing public hospitals in the country and it is the pride of the nation. It continues to provide healthcare services of a specialised nature and of international standard to many communities not only in the Gauteng province but also beyond, even to our neighbouring countries in the region.”
“The high-quality services that are provided by the Steve Biko Academic Hospital encourage our government to put extra efforts in advancing our healthcare system and ensure that all public hospitals and clinics provide a similar standard of services to improve the health of our people and ensure that they live longer and healthier lives,” Zuma said.
In the last assessment on National Core of the Office of Health Standards Compliance in March 2015, the Steve Biko Hospital was declared the best well managed public hospital in the country and its overall score was 96%, the highest in the country, due to its remarkable performance and sound management.
The report says the hospital attends to more than 483,624 patients in its specialist clinics annually, and admits more than 40,441 patients annually as in-patients and a gradual increase of emergency patients to 31,288 in 2016-2017 from 18,000 of 3 prior years.
The hospital also caters for patients from Limpopo, Mpumalanga and North West provinces for a number of services including radiotherapy, medical oncology, open heart surgery, cystic fibrosis, interventional cardiology and haemophilia services, as well as childhood kidney and cardiac services.
This academic hospital also provides a training platform to students from the University of Pretoria, Tshwane University of Technology as well as the SG Lourens Nursing.
[link url="https://www.cnbcafrica.com/apo/2017/11/03/president-zuma-appraises-steve-biko-hospital-and-reaffirms-governments-commitment-to-provide-quality-healthcare-to-all-citizens/"]CNBC Afirca report[/link]