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Nqobile Tshili, Chronicle Reporter
UNITED Bulawayo Hospitals (UBH)’s designated Covid-19 centre Old Bartley Memorial Block will open on November 16 for critical patients following completion of renovations.

UBH was selected to handle Covid-19 patients while renovations on the designated Ekusileni Medical Centre and Thorngrove Infectious Disease Hospital are still on going.

The hospital then identified Old Bartley Memorial Block as one of Bulawayo’s Covid-19 centres and Government disbursed $100 million towards the renovation of the facility.

UBH has been using a separate ward to admit Covid-19 patients while renovations were going on at Old Bartley Memorial Block.

This was revealed during a visit to UBH facility by the Minister of State for Presidential Affairs Responsible for Monitoring and Implementation of Government Programmes, Dr Joram Gumbo.

Minister Gumbo visited the hospital to check on progress made in the renovation of the Old Bartley Memorial Block Covid-19 centre and the Obstetric Fistula Unit (OFU) both housed at the hospital.

The projects are being implemented under the 100-day project cycle.

While the Covid-19 centre will open in two weeks, OFU unit will be completed at the end of March next year.

Both projects are significant to the growth of the hospital which services the southern parts of the country.

UBH acting chief executive officer Dr Narcisius Dzvanga said the hospital was conducting finishing touches before opening doors for patients.

“We are targeting 16 November to open the facility. I think it would be on a Tuesday. We are not starting from zero because we had some elderly people who were living there. So, the same furniture which was there is at the recreation room and would be used in the rooms. What is left is just to clean up the facility,” said Dr Dzvanga.

He said opening of the facility was important as the country is still recording new Covid-19 cases.

“We are not yet out of danger and it’s a virus that prefers humidity and cold weather. You might realise that we are now in the rain season and cases might spike again. Overall, we have had 64 admissions since the Covid-19 started. We receive at least two patients per week. That gives an insight of the magnitude of the problem that we still have,” he said.

The new facility will also attend to critical patients who need oxygen.

Post-Covid-19, the hospital wants to turn Old Bartley Memorial Block into a private ward which it can use to generate additional funds.

Dr Dzvanga said normalcy has returned in other hospital departments as patients who had in the past shunned UBH thinking it was only receiving Covid-19 patients, were now visiting the health facility for other services.

“We are almost back to our usual figures. The latest statistics that I got today shows that we have 219 in patients at the hospital while our normal average is about 300 patients,” said Dr Dzvanga.

Meanwhile, the Obstetric Fistula Unit (OFU) under construction at the hospital is the first of its kind in the southern part of the country.

The unit will serve women who develop vaginal injuries during childbirth which results in them failing to control urine or faecal matter.

This challenge is said to be breaking marriages while the affected women lose their self-esteem in some instances, becoming social outcasts.

Countrywide, the service is offered in Mashonaland West at Chinhoyi General hospital, making the service in inaccessible to scores of needy women.

Dr Dzvanga said the OFU, was critical not just for Bulawayo but the southern parts of the country as women affected by the condition were not getting treatment.

He said doctors will use the facility to learn how the disease is treated before cascading the service to district hospitals.

“It is going to be a centre of excellence and training centre for other gynaecologists and doctors in the districts,” said Dzvanga.

Minister Gumbo said he was elated with developments being made at UBH.

“The $103 million that the Government put for the renovation of this (Covid-19 ward) facility its really something that one can be proud of. It’s a facility that will benefit the people of Bulawayo and beyond. The OFU will enable patients to be treated here as opposed to travelling all the way to Chinhoyi to seek treatment,” said Minister Gumbo.

He said the 100-day cycle programme was benefiting people as far as implementing projects was concerned because it was keeping Government ministries on their toes. — @nqotshili