QECH tough on emergency ward

The Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital (QECH) on Monday started implementing tough measures for people who by-pass health centres and hospitals by directly going to its Adult Emergency and Trauma Centre (AETC).

In a written notice, the hospital management has notified the facility users that the centre is reserved for appropriately referred patients with emergency conditions and major trauma and all patients who do not meet the criteria will be sent back to their nearest health centre.

According to the notice, patients who have been referred from another health centre, but do not meet the criteria, will be down-referred to the nearest Gateway clinic as agreed with the Blantyre District Health Office.

“Those who insist on being attended to in the AETC will be required to pay a by-pass fee of K2,500. The same applies to staff members who by-pass the staff clinic at the OPD 1[Outpatient Department 1] when they are sick. This will be with effect from the 21st March 2016,” the notice which has been placed in various strategic points around the hospital premises reads.

In an interview on Tuesday, the Chief Hospital Administrator, Themba Mhango, said the referral hospital has been receiving a lot of primary health care patients and the only way to decongest the centre was to implement the already existing ministry of health policy.

Other major referral hospitals of Zomba, Mzuzu and Kamuzu Central already started implementing the system which is part of the country’s Health Sector Reforms.

“We have got a number of entry points but for the AETC we receive, on average, over 300 patients. We also have several specialist clinics, so roughly I can keep the figure at over 500 outpatients per day.

“I think the community has to understand that there is an existing policy within the ministry that the first point of call is a health centre and from there if they cannot treat that patient the clinician has to refer them to higher level and since Blantyre does not have a district hospital then we will receive them as referred patient,” Mhango said.