Organ transplant facility on the cards at SKMTH
Many refer to it as the slaughterhouse or simply where many patients have gone and never returned alive.
In fact some still get cold chills just passing by Sir Ketumile Masire Teaching Hospital (SKMTH), the place where five or more death cases were registered daily at the height of Covid-19 in 2020 and 2021.
But what most Batswana do not know, is that beyond being a Covid-19 referral hospital and isolation centre, SKMTH is a state-of-the-art medical facility.
Although the hospital is not officially opened yet, it is partially operational. Corporate Communications and Public Relations Manager, Selwana Pilatwe confirms that the official opening is on the cards.
Once fully operational, it will operate as a referral hospital and patients will not be allowed to walk in for consultation, but will be attended to on referral basis.
SKMTH will make history in the near future as the first and only hospital to deal with renal organ transplant in the country.
Botswana has been relying heavily on international assistance when it comes to services such as heart and kidney transplants among others. Patients needing such services travelled to countries such as India and South Africa.
With SKMTH fully operational, patients will be attended to locally without having to first travel halfway across the world.
When such services are available it also means that Botswana will have highly-skilled personnel at SKMHT enabling learning for students.
In the process this will fulfil SKMTH mandate of being a hospital that teaches and facilitates the development of health care professionals.
They also wish to have an environment for conducting medical research.
Other services offered at the hospital will include Cardiovascular, Comprehensive Cancer care, Trauma and Burns and a branch of science concerned with the study and treatment of disorders and diseases of the eye (Ophthalmology).
Selwana explained that they have one of the largest Intensive Care Units (ICU) in the country, with a capacity of 36 beds and a total of 450 for the entire hospital.
“We have state-of-the-art Radiology equipment, which means that waiting periods will be reduced and reports released on time,” Selwana said.