Make me president and I’ll make it all better
When I’m in charge, all politicians, including me, will be mandated to use government hospitals, writes Andrew Human
Afriend was recently in a car accident and taken to Helen Joseph Hospital. There was concern that she’d damaged her spine. She was stabilised and put in a neck brace, X-rays were taken and she was admitted to a ward. She needed an MRI scan to determine how serious her injuries were and whether she needed surgery or not.
At that stage things slowed down. The MRI wasn’t available on the weekend and she had to wait until Monday. She lay in bed with no treatment and no further examination.
Visiting hours at the hospital are from 4pm to 5pm every day and only one visitor per patient is allowed. Women enter on the left and men on the right. It seems a strange time for visiting hour. It’s a government hospital and the patients are working class. To visit at 4pm during the week means people have to leave work at 3pm. This can’t be easy for the average working Joe — they’re not professionals who can simply “make time”.
Why is there no visiting in the evening? Why are private hospitals more flexible with visiting hours?
But back to the MRI. There was a backlog, so after the weekend she couldn’t get a scan and had to wait for a spot. Tuesday passed, and Wednesday. While she lay there waiting, there was no examination, no follow-up, no information. All the while she was lying on her back, immobile and only able to look straight ahead at the ceiling.
On the Thursday they took her to the MRI unit. Then there was loadshedding and the lifts didn’t work. This is a large academic government hospital and lifts cannot operate during loadshedding.
How is this possible? I have a restaurant and I’ve made sure I can still serve cappuccinos during loadshedding. Surely an MRI is more important than a hot coffee?
She was left lying in the corridor for most of the day, waiting for the power to come on. Late in the afternoon she was finally able to have the scan. But this was the Thursday before the Easter weekend — they locked the MRI unit and her report inside. She had to wait until Tuesday after the Easter weekend to get feedback on what was wrong with her.
She was left alone the entire Easter weekend. Try and imagine being in that situation: Not knowing if you’ll need an operation, not knowing if you’ll get your mobility back. Not getting any information at all. On the Tuesday morning the MRI report was brought to her bed. The attending doctor said he couldn’t speak to her, his “boss” would have to speak to her. And he left. What did that mean? Was it terrible news that could only be conveyed by the senior doctor? Nobody came back for the rest of the day.
The next morning, Wednesday, the professor came in and said the MRI showed no signs of fracture and that she could go home. She was told to keep the neck brace on and return in five weeks for another X-ray. No more information was provided.
After she’d been home for a few days I took her to a GP with experience in sports and trauma injuries. He read the MRI report and examined her. He felt the muscles on her arm where she had pain and on her back and neck. He informed her she had torn ligaments in her arm, back and neck.
Luckily, she had no fractures or snapped ligaments. He said she should only wear the brace for another two weeks and didn’t need to return to the hospital. Further X-rays would serve no purpose.
Incredibly, during her entire stay at the hospital no-one gave her a physical examination. No-one discovered the torn ligaments in her arm and back. In the 20 minutes with the GP she received more care and attention than in the two weeks she was in an academic teaching hospital. How did this country get here? How can a hospital meant for the benefit of the population provide such poor service? How can an academic hospital offer so little learning? How did we fall so far?
I can’t say exactly how we got here, but I’ll tell you how I’ll fix it when I’m president: I’ll make it mandatory that all politicians and their families are only allowed to use government hospitals — including me. And while I’m at it, politicians will have to send their children to government schools. This, I guarantee you, will fix public healthcare and education overnight.
Make me president.