Gauteng hospitals catch up with cataract operations
Over 700 cataract surgeries were performed across the province recently.
With a drop in Covid-19 cases, various Gauteng hospitals decided to catch up with cataract operations over October.
Over 700 cataract surgeries were performed across the province, according to the spokesperson for the Gauteng health MEC, Kwara Kekana.
“The pandemic considerably affected public hospitals’ ability to perform planned surgeries because resources were repurposed to fight the Covid-19,” said Kekana.
“With the drop in infections and hospital admissions, public hospitals can now dedicate resources to other healthcare services.”
Amongst the high performing hospitals was Kalafong in Pretoria West, which did 205 cataract surgeries in two weeks.
The Dr George Mukhari academic hospital and St John’s eye hospital did 132 and 124 operations respectively.
In the West Rand, Leratong hospital performed 105 operations.
In the Johannesburg health district, the Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg academic hospital did 94 while Helen Joseph hospital performed 64 operations in October.
A cataract is a cloudiness of the lens of the eye which occurs in many people as they grow older, but can also happen in younger people due to diseases.
Cataract surgery is performed to remove the lens of the eye which affects vision.
Other hospitals will conduct their cataract marathon surgeries in November.
Read original story on rekord.co.za
