Pretoria - The highest medical negligence claims against the Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital stem from the maternity unit, which faces claims amounting to nearly R1 billion.
This was the admission of former Gauteng Health MEC Nomathemba Mokgethi in her written reply to questions by DA spokesperson on health Jack Bloom in the Gauteng provincial legislature. Mokgethi said 85% of the medico-legal litigations concerned the maternity unit, at 51.
She also gave details about broken medical equipment, lack of staff and the risk posed to newborn children, due to the broken equipment at the hospital – the largest in Africa and the third-largest in the world.
Mokgethi gave these responses on September 27, before her removal from office on October 6. She was replaced by Nomantu Nkomo-Ralehoko.
The maternity unit at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital faces R1bn in medical negligence claims, and is short of staff, operating theatres and working equipment.
According to the Gauteng Health Department, there are 26 staff vacancies, four of the 12 sonar machines are broken, and two overhead warmers in the labour ward are not working.
Mokgethi said the cooling unit for two operating theatres was broken for six days and patients were operated on in high temperatures, which increased the infection risk. There was also an increased risk of hypothermia (abnormally low temperature) in newborn babies because of the non-functional overhead warmers.
Fifty-one medical negligence claims totalling R992 million have been filed against the maternity unit in the past four years. Half of these cases concerned cerebral palsy in babies, with individual claims ranging from R10m to R51m. The amounts claimed are high as they have to cover the cost of a lifetime of medical care.
There are claims for the deaths of five babies, with amounts ranging from R400 000 to R7m.
The highest claim is R65m for alleged negligence in treating a pregnant woman who developed a womb infection, leading to an emergency hysterectomy and heart and kidney complications requiring dialysis.
Other claims include alleged negligence leading to removal of the womb and cases of swabs allegedly left in patients after surgery.
The department said there was a low number of deaths and infections in the maternity unit, but the high negligence claims showed there were allegedly many cases of poor medical care leading to injury and death.
It identified the need for three dedicated obstetric theatres for emergency Caesarean sections, the creation of more posts for all categories of staff including advanced midwives and an increase in theatres from four to five.
Reacting to the replies, Bloom said the tragedy was that money spent on negligence cases could have been avoided if the unit was properly staffed with adequate equipment, saying no amount of money could compensate for loss of life and life-long injuries caused by negligence.
“The Bara Maternity Unit needs urgent improvement as it is the busiest in the country, delivering 20 000 babies a year,” he said.
Bloom said his party was advocating for a laser-like focus on improving management and resources in all hospital maternity units where so much costly negligence occurred.
Pretoria News