Frere Hospital, East London, South Africa

Frere Hospital and the Hospital Board would like to share the benefit of accessing health services close to our homes. The Primary Health Care(PHC) is essentially the healthcare that is provided in the community for people. The PHC should be the initial contact that community makes with the health care service in South Africa. This in includes the clinics and community health centres (CHC). These facilities are staffed with qualified and competent healthcare. When we access the health care service in these facilities, we are guaranteed to be served by the same health care professional. This creates a lasting relationship where the health care professional understands our conditions and develops a treatment plan. The PHC services are free. When accessing health care at the tertiary hospital like Frere, it is not always that we will be attended to by the doctors. We therefore have to explain health challenges to a new person every time. This is due to the nature of the service as a specialist teaching hospital, doctors rotate in various clinical disciplines. The hospitals attends to patients from a vast catchment area whereas the clinics and CHC, attend to patients in their immediate locality. The doctors, pharmacists, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, dieticians, speech and audiology therapists and social workers from the hospitals also visits these facilities on a regular basis to offer services that the offer at the hospital.

The population of East London has grown as compared to the time when Frere Hospital maternity unit was built. At that time an average of 50 babies a month were delivered in the unit. Today an average of 450 babies are delivered in the unit. The ECDOH has acknowledged that Frere Hospital maternity has to be extended to make sure each and every mother coming to our facility can enjoy that moment of bringing to life that bundle of joy. The Hospital Board and Management are therefore appealing to the community to be patient during this construction period of increasing the number of beds. Our dedicated specialists and nurses will continue to serve our mothers to be to the best of their ability.

Frere hospital would like to share with the community we serve that some times patients wait too long to be attended to. The staff do their utmost best to attend to patients as soon as they can. The hospital is experiencing high influx of patients who are referred from lower service health facilities in Joe Gqabi, Chris Hani, Amathole and Buffalo City districts, and other patients self refer themselves. The hospital services a population of
3.2 million of these districts. According to the National Health Services Referral Policy of South Africa, Frere Hospital is a Tertiary Hospital that must offer specialist services that are not available at all other health facilities in these districts, hence patients must be referred by clinicians from those facilities. The hospital is also mandated to train health professionals from university students to specialists in all fields related to health.
The following categories of patients are prioritized when arriving at our casualty unit: children under 5 years, senior citizens(65 years and above), disabled patients and motor vehicle accident patients and those brought by emergency services.
Patients are advised to seek medical attention at health facilities close to their homes as they will receive the services faster (clinics, community health centres and district hospitals). These facilities are resourced with equipment and qualified staff to offer health services that do not need require specialist care.
We value all our patients, your health is our priority. Assist us to serve you better.

Please note that any complaints related to Frere Hospital can be emailed to [email protected]. The email will go to our internal quality assurance team, who will then look into the matter.