South Africa: The department wishes to inform members of the public that Mokopane Regional Hospital has been partially closed, temporarily.
This happened after heavy thunderstorms damaged the hospital’s electricity supply infrastructure that, which includes a medium voltage pole and cables.
The hospital has since been forced to run for over 36 hours by means of a stand by generator that ultimately gave in.
Technicians tried to fix the generator, but it only managed to run for a few hours before suffering more break downs.
Due to the fact that the country is now on stage 6 load shedding, the department is unable to reassign generators from other facilities to assist in the meantime since they also need the generators for load shedding.
As a result, ICU patients at Mokopane Regional Hospital have been evacuated to Petersburg and Mankweng Hospitals, while other patients have been taken to Voortrekker Hospital.
The department advised community members who wanted to visit the hospital’s casualty or OPD to go to Voortrekker or George Masebe hospitals.
ESKOM technicians and the department’s infrastructure unit are on the ground working around the clock to ensure that this challenge is resolved.
On the other hand, Nkhensani Hospital is running a 2-day workshop (6-7 December) on Helping Babies Breathe (HBB) and Newborn Transition and Neonatal Resuscitation (NTNR) for its doctors and nurses from the hospital and its 28 feeder clinics (Greater Giyani sub-district) in an effort to improve the care and survival of all newborns in the sub-district.
HBB focuses on The Golden Minute when stimulation to breathe and ventilation with a bag and mask can save a life. All babies deserve to have an optimally skilled person to help a baby breathe when they are born.
It is estimated that 1 in 10 babies require some form of assistance to start breathing on their own when born. Hence the importance of consistently capacitating all healthcare workers with evidence-based practices such as HBB and NTNR to improve the quality of care that we provide in the province.
Nkhensani Hospital was supported by HBB facilitators from Philidelphia, Sekororo, Letaba, Mankweng, Pietersburg and Malamulele hospitals.