​Rofhiwa Marubini
The Gauteng Department of Health has announced measures to deal with the long waiting periods for elective surgeries at the Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital.
The measures to be employed include referring surgeries to Thelle Mogoerane Hospital in Vosloosrus, Ekurhuleni and Leratong Hospital in Kagiso, West Rand.
The department has also increased theatre capacity at the Bheki Mlangeni District Hospital, in Soweto to accommodate patients from Baragwanath Hospital.
Over 7 000 people were on the hospital waiting list for surgeries such as knee, hip, cataract, maxillofacial, urology, tumour, and sepsis.
Cataract surgery, known as lens replacement surgery, has the greatest number of patients waiting with 2 572 on the list. They are followed by paediatrics surgery with 1048 patients.
The department attributed the backlog to the COVID-19 pandemic which put planned surgeries on hold.​