Another Gauteng hospital without adequate psychiatric wards

21 June 2017

Kopanong Hospital in Vereeniging has one male psychiatric ward that can accommodate 30 patients, but 243 patients had to be placed in other wards over a one year period because it was full.

This is revealed by Gauteng Health MEC Gwen Ramokgopa in a written reply to my questions in the Gauteng Legislature.

According to Ramokgopa, 779 psychiatric patients were seen from March 2016 to March this year, but only 536 could be placed in the psychiatric ward.

This means that every month about 20 psychiatric patients are placed in ordinary wards which is not good practice for security and other reasons.

Ramokgopa says that "if all usable beds are occupied then patients are placed temporarily in a male medical ward awaiting placement in a psychiatric ward as soon as a bed becomes available."

She admits that one patient was assaulted recently by a psychiatric patient, receiving a laceration above the eye. I know of another incident where a nurse was stabbed with a scissors.

Ramokgopa says that extra staff are needed for the psychiatric patients and that the specialised psychiatric ward for males will be completed as well as renovation of a female ward into a specialised psychiatric ward.

There is a problem of inadequate psychiatric wards at a number of state hospitals in Gauteng, including South Rand Hospital and delayed renovations of the psychiatric wards at the Helen Joseph and Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg hospitals.

The Esidimeni debacle has highlighted the neglect often suffered by psychiatric patients who should always be placed in modern specialised wards with good security and well-trained staff.

Issued by Jack Bloom, DA Gauteng Shadow MEC for Health, 21 June 2017