The clinic’s senior nursing officer, Mary Saungweme, lamented the fact that patients were forced to wait in long queues for hours as the health institution could no longer accommodate the numbers.
Saungweme revealed that the polyclinic only had two toilets for both sexes and the disabled.
“The problem is that we are much smaller than the population that we are serving. It’s no longer comfortable. Sometimes you find the patients waiting outside in queues. We can’t really accommodate them inside,” she said, adding that furniture was dilapidated and some treatments were in short supply.
The senior nursing officer also said the polyclinic was in dire need of a maternity ward, as mothers had to be sent to other polyclinics or the provincial hospital.
Mutare city council acting health director Simon Mashavave said the situation there was very sad and inconvenient for residents. If funds permitted, he said, they needed to build another polyclinic to meet needs of the area.
“When this clinic was built, it was to cater for the small population we had at the time. The idea now is to keep this clinic as it is and put another bigger polyclinic at the other end of the suburb,” said Mashavave.
Post published in: News