Nurse shortage hits council clinics

05 Feb, 2017 - 00:02 0 Views
Nurse shortage hits council clinics Miss Bongiwe Ngwenya

The Sunday News

Miss Bongiwe Ngwenya

Miss Bongiwe Ngwenya

Robin Muchetu, Senior Reporter
BULAWAYO City Council-run clinics are facing a shortage of 124 nurses, a situation that has resulted in non-trained workers complementing staff by doing jobs they are not qualified for.

The council clinics need to operate with a nurse complement of 296 nurses but have 172. The council’s public relations officer, Miss Bongiwe Ngwenya, said all council clinics have been affected by the shortage of nurses.

“All the clinics are short staffed with Nkulumane division at 73 nurses out of an expected 114, Emakhandeni division has 57 out of 104 nurses and northern suburbs at 42 out of 78 registered nurses,” she said.

Nursing staff at council run clinics are deployed according to the size of the catchment area for the clinic. The larger the clinic catchment area, the more nurses it should have but that is not the case as council is short staffed. Miss Ngwenya said the nursing staff in the clinics was approved before the advent of HIV.

“However, we must note that the authorised number of nursing staff per clinic was approved before the advent of HIV. This has had a serious demand on our staff as well as increase in the number of patients visiting the clinics,” she said.

Patients are now able to collect Antiretroviral medication at council clinics meaning that there is an increase of human traffic that needs the assistance of nurses. Miss Ngwenya said the auxiliary staff was assisting to ease the pressure at clinics.

“Nurse aides assist in taking the temperatures from patients and not general hands as purported. This is done to enable efficient triaging of very sick patients,” said Miss Ngwenya.

The clinics are also facing a shortage of sisters-in-charge and community health sisters. There are are 12 sisters-in-charge out of 19 clinics and 11 community health sisters. The Government in 2015 suggested that all councils should provide 24-hour outpatient services manned by a medical officer at their clinics, in a bid to increase the scope of health care centres and offer comprehensive services at primary care levels.

 

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