Huge passion for small patients
Four doctors are working around the clock to slash infant and child mortality rates at Dora Nginza. From 525 baby deaths at the hospital between 2011 and 2012, the rate stood at 267 last year. Health writer Estelle Ellis spoke to ‘the baby rescuers’ team
THEIR phones do not stop ringing. As the four dedicated doctors sit down for a chat about their journey, calls about their little patients keep on coming. The four – Drs Pinkie Zozi, Cheryl MacKay, Adele Greyling and Andile Nxele – have made serious inroads into bringing down the mortality rates – but it has taken sacrifice, grit and long hours.
Zozi, who qualified as Dora Nginza’s first paediatric intensive care specialist, works by herself looking after the hospital’s sickest little patients.
An MBChb graduate from the University of Cape Town who qualified as a paediatrician at Walter Sisulu University and then worked at Dora Nginza, Zozi said: “Every day we saw children who were so ill and we did not have a specialist in paediatric intensive care.
“We tried to get someone to come and help us but it turned out to be almost impossible. So then I decided, ‘let me do this myself’.”
So, Zozi left her family behind in Port Elizabeth for two years while she requalified at the University of the Witwatersrand and Baragwanath Hospital.
Today, she has big plans for her six-bed unit. “I am hoping and praying for someone to come and help me as at the moment I am all by myself,” she said.
“We need to extend the unit to 12 beds, and we also need more high-care beds.”
The hope was also to encourage more nurses to qualify in the specialised field.
“There is no reason for a child to die just because they could not access intensive care. Just because a child is poor should not mean they should receive substandard care,” Zozi said. MacKay started working as a specialist neonatologist – looking after newborns – at Dora Nginza in March, giving up her private practice in Johannesburg to return to the public sector where her passion lies.
Knowing MacKay could make a big difference at Dora Nginza, the hospital’s former head of paediatrics, Dr Lungile Pepeta, pushed for a job to be created for her.
Shortly after arriving at the hospital, MacKay set about rearranging the unit for better medical care. This week the hospital’s first Kangaroo Mother Care Ward, with eight beds, was opened.
Kangaroo mother care promotes skinto-skin contact between parents and baby – highly beneficial for newborns.
“We wanted to create a special place for moms with premature babies and those who need high care – we want them to stay with their moms,” MacKay said.
“We want to make sure moms are very comfortable and that our ‘slow growers’ get all the attention they need.”
She said she had submitted an application for accreditation to train more neonatologists through Walter Sisulu University.
Greyling returned from Antwerp in Belgium – where she trained to become the first paediatric cardiologist in the country specialising in electrophysiology (heart rhythm disturbances) – to take over the reins at the paediatric cardiology department early this year from Pepeta, who left the post late last year.
“We are keen to get this service [electrophysiology] off the ground. We have ordered the equipment and already have five patients who need treatment.
“I was blessed to walk into a well-run unit left behind by Pepeta,” she said.
“We still have massive backlogs for patients needing surgical care. One of the main reasons for this is a shortage of highcare and ICU beds, so we are really happy that Dr Zozi is back.”
Nxele, who “will do anything for my patients”, recently left private practice, after qualifying as a paediatric cardiologist.
Along with Greyling, he will be kept very busy due to the province’s unusually high rate of congenital heart disease.
Livingstone Tertiary Hospital chief executive Thulane Madonsela – under whom all public hospital specialists in Nelson Mandela Bay fall – said Pepeta, who is now dean of NMMU’s Faculty of Health Sciences, had been quietly working pro bono to assist the new team.