After waiting for more than two months for a hip operation at Sabie Hospital, Dietlof Ziegfried Vermaak (65) was finally transferred to Themba Hospital on Tuesday.

Lowvelder reported on the challenges he was facing with waiting for months to be transferred to the hospital that is able to perform the operation he needed.

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Vermaak fell and broke his hip. He was admitted to the hospital for assistance, but his family raised their concerns about the treatment he had been receiving.

On Tuesday, one of the family members contacted the newspaper, stating that Vermaak was on his way to Themba Hospital.

Pierre Nothnagel, his son-in-law, also confirmed that he is been transferred.

“It seems like things are happening after the article. I got the news that he is been transferred. The only thing I am worried about is that the doctor does not communicate with my father-in-law. He was just told that he will be transferred,” he said.

Nothnagel had previously raised various concerns about the hospital.

“He has bedsores and he is depressed. We want the operation to be done so that he won’t go through the pain he is facing,” he explained.

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The spokesman for the provincial Department of Health, Dumisani Malamule, had not addressed Vermaak’s specific case when the newspaper asked him about it. He only explained that a hip replacement is a specialised operation that cannot be performed at Sabie, which is a district hospital.

Vermaak is on the waiting list at Themba, which has an orthopaedic surgeon.It is unclear when the operation will be done.