Picture: A knife stuck near the spinal cord of a patient/Facebook
By OBAKENG MAJE
The family of Kagiso Itumeleng said they were disappointed after they received adverse treatment at Joe Morolong Memorial Hospital in Vryburg on Sunday. This comes after Itumeleng (19) was allegedly stabbed with a knife near his spinal cord. One of the family members, who calls herself Ayra Starr on Facebook, raised her concerns. Starr said they arrived at the hospital at 10am on Sunday but received no help.
“Since we arrived here at 10am at the hospital after our son was stabbed with a knife. However, no one is willing to help us after we spent some hours, while the knife is still stuck on him. He was stabbed next to the spinal cord.
“This hospital is useless and its doctors are incompetent. People will just die, while medical doctors are loitering around without assisting them,” she said.
Meanwhile, the North West Department of Health spokesperson, Tebogo Lekgethwane said: “The Management of Joe Morolong Memorial Hospital has swiftly acted on this matter by instituting an enquiry to establish what has transpired. To ensure utmost objectivity, the hospital will appoint an independent investigator to establish the facts.
“The concerned family were offered counselling and a meeting with the hospital management was held as part of the redress process. Currently, the hospital is constantly updating the family on the developments pertaining to the treatment process of the patient.”
Lekgethwane further said, the hospital is appealing to members of the public to report any mistreatment levelled against them from the staff members. He added that, in order to ensure that this process runs smoothly, there are portraits depicting “Know who is in charge”, strategically placed on various hospital premises, in order for members of the public to report any form of misconduct.
“Furthermore, staff members are requested to wear Hospital Identification Tags, for ease of reference when reporting. The hospital is committed to provision of quality healthcare services and condemns any mistreatment that compromises its values. The Quality Assurance Office is embedded with the responsibility of ensuring that patients’ complaints are addressed.
“The preliminary investigation revealed that the patient was attended to and assessed. The family was updated and we also learnt that some of the family members who were not yet updated took the issue to social media without full update,” said Lekgethwane.
He said the case needed to be approached diligently as rushing to remove the knife could have dire consequences. Lekgethwane said there was a potential of the patient being permanently disabled, if there was no thorough investigation of the extent of the damage on organs affected before the knife was removed.
“This caused the delay in removing the knife. In the end after consultations, second opinions and further examinations, the specialists decided to further refer the patient to Klerksdorp Tertiary Hospital,” he said.
The Guardian 