For two consecutive years, the African Nursing Conference has provided a platform for public and private practitioners to learn more about each other.
This is according to Dr Tracey de Klerk, chair of the Gauteng department of health, who was speaking at the two-day Fifth African Nursing Conference which started on Wednesday and will continue until Thursday at the Birchwood Hotel & OR Tambo Conference Centre in Boksburg.
“For the past two conferences, there were many requests for the public to know more about private, and private to know more about public, especially with the word NHI (National Health Insurance) and people not understanding that NHI is a fund and that we are looking at universal health coverage,” she said.
Different speakers across the Sadc region and various provinces in the country tackled different topics about the nurses' profession and the challenges they have.
De Klerk said the conference was more focused on universal health coverage. She said it was about showing people that public and private health nurses could work together — but first, they need to understand each other.
“Sometimes we need to ask a question, not just to get a response, but to get that understanding. Because when you understand, whether it's culture, environment or even the health ecosystem, it touches your mind, it touches your heart to have a look at the magnitude of the public sector and why the public sector also needs that support,” she said.
According to her, they are using the conference to look at the best practices, and both public and private practitioners were combining ideas on how best nurses can work together during the NHI implementation.
“What can we do collectively to move forward? Because, you know, there's a proverb that says, if you want to go fast, go alone. But if you want to go far, go together.
“We want to go far; we want the system to find a way to work. Yes, we know that there are issues, whether it is staffing, whether it is resources, but somewhere we have to begin,” she said.
The acting chief director of Sedibeng District, Sonwabo Lindani, said the NHI is not a system but a funding model which is going to charter the health department to universal coverage, a global call by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
“So no nurses, no NHI. You know that there are so many nurses who are out there not employed. The main thing that NHI is all about is ensuring that the health system and healthcare are available to everybody, regardless of their financial status,” he said.
He added that the nursing conference started with topics that touch on the scientific proof as to why the country needed NHI. He said the conference focused on a scientific reason nurses or human resources are needed for NHI to succeed.
“In this case, we're talking about nurses. As you know, the backbone of the health profession in the country, and even globally, is nurses.
“With nurses, we normally say they don't do a hit and run. They are with a patient 24/7. A doctor will come to see a patient for that period and leave. An X-ray guy will come, and the physiotherapy guy will come. A nurse is with a patient seven days a week and 24 hours a day,” he added.
He said this was the reason to have the resources consolidated so that they could increase the capacity of hiring nurses and be able to care, and the systems could be capacitated to care for the patients.
“The other main challenge that we have in the country, and our province, particularly, is that our facilities are very old.
“Infrastructure is debilitated, and there are plans by the province. The infrastructure is being handled by Gauteng health. We are reviving and renovating a lot of our hospitals,” he said.
TimesLIVE
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