Name of health worker: Biira Janet
Occupation: Midwife
Masaka Regional Referral Hospital
A health workers frustration managing uncooperative COVID-19 patients.
My experience in managing COVID-19 patients has been quite frustrating. These patients are not cooperative because being infectious, they think that we don’t treat them the way we do the other patients
The challenge is that these COVID-19 patients give us false names and telephone numbers. When we want to follow-up by paying these patients a visit after they are discharged, we are unable to trace them. And, they always demand for good meals at all times which the hospital can’t afford.
They don’t tell us their real names, real telephone numbers and where they come from for fear that they will not fit in the community.
To handle this, we improvised that on admission of these COVID-19 patients; firstly we counsel them, then requested for their real names and contact details. This has made follow up of these patients easier after we discharged them. We also informed them prior to the kind of meals served while in our care but overall, there have been no persistent challenges.