Neurosurgery to resume at PE hospital

Neurosurgery at Livingstone Hospital should resume by the end of this month with a multimillion-rand neurology microscope expected to arrive at the facility by the end of this week.

Eastern Cape health spokesman Sizwe Kupelo said the department would take delivery of the microscope on Thursday and it would be installed over the weekend.

“Training will be done after that,” he said.

Kupelo said there was no waiting list for neurosurgery as urgent cases had been referred to Frere Hospital and paediatric neurosurgical patients had been referred to the Western Cape.

The microscope currently at the hospital broke in September and was declared irreparable by the manufacturer.
The department did not approve the emergency procurement of a new microscope.

Monica Brown, whose sister Martha Vers has a brain tumour, said her sister would now be referred to Cape Town as her condition had become critical in the time they were waiting for the microscope.

She said Vers had become bedridden and her children were looking after her.

Wendy Weyer-Henderson, who also needs neurosurgery, said doctors were talking about sending her to Cape Town as well.

“If the microscope is coming here it would be so much better. They have made so many promises that it’s coming.”

She attended Livingstone Hospital on Friday to make a plan for her to access surgery. “It would be an answer to many prayers if the microscope arrives.”