Inside a Zimbabwean hospital

For me, the nights were literally a time of nightmares. The chap in charge (the male duty nurse) was cruel, inconsiderate and heartless to extremes. He would probably fit in well at a police station or prison. The second in command, a female, was a replica of her boss.

From time to time a patient, mostly bed-ridden, would call out for assistance. Nobody bothered to reply or go to the patient. On the few occasions they responded, it would be, Yes! What? Im coming, followed by a long wait.

I remember the chap in charge actually pumped up the volume on the television to drown a patients voice calling for help. This is behaviour that one would only associate with secret service torture chambers, not a medical institution.

Gloves were in short supply and the staff had a ready excuse for not attending to patients, even where no contact was involved. I had gloves brought in, but this did not seem to have endeared me to the staff. Why, I figured out, was I making them work when they should be watching television? Was it that staff could not leave the screen at a particular time lest they might miss the plot of the movie?

Repairs and rehabilitation of infrastructure at government institutions have been underway since the formation of the coalition government. Hopefully the staff will become more motivated as their working conditions improve. Still, in all honesty, if I had a choice, I would not like to be under the care of that night brigade leader and his lieutenants again.

The one thing I can say about my month-long confinement at Parirenyatwa General Hospital, is that the support services might not be commensurate with the fees charged. I would also add that the private practitioners who use facilities there might be risking compromising their professional reputation by dealing with a large institution not normally associated with work ethics.