New Faces on Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital Facility Board

The new chairperson, Mr Usman Ahmed and deputy chairperson, Mrs Penny Gill were elected onto the Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital Facility Board on Wednesday 21 August 2013. Both electees have worked with the hospital and bring with them a rich source of both health and business experience.

Mr Usman is the director of several businesses, chairman of the Aboobaker & Usman Ahmed Charitable Trust and a Trustee of the Children’s Hospital Trust.

Of his appointment, Mr Usman says: “My hopes and vision is for the facilities board to be able to work with all other hospital stakeholders in a cohesive manner to ensure service delivery to beneficiaries who use the hospital.”

Mrs Gill’s history with the hospital stretches back to 1966, when she began her training as a student nurse.

“In those days the hospital had its own student nurse training programme. I completed my paediatric nurse training in 1973 and later qualified as a paediatric nurse educator. I was responsible for running the hospital’s paediatric nurse training programme from 1992 to 1999, with nurses from as far as Kenya, Central African Republic and Namibia,” she said.

In 1992 Mrs Gill became a member of the board of the Friends of the Children’s Hospital Association and chaired the board from 2009 to 2012.

“I have been a board member of the Hospital Facility Board for the past three years. I currently work for the Cape Peninsula University of Technology at the Western Cape College of Nursing in Athlone as a first-year nursing lecturer, where I am responsible for teaching an extended curriculum nursing programme for historically, educationally disadvantaged students in the four-year nursing diploma,” she said.

“My hopes and vision is that the Hospital Facility Board will continue to be responsive to the needs of patients and their families, to appreciate the dedicated care of the staff and to continue to ensure accountability of health facility management to the community.”

Western Cape Health Minister, Theuns Botha, says: "Facility boards play a very important role in accommodating the needs of the community at the hospital. It is the people's hospital. I am very thankful for the active role that this board plays, and will support them. In particular, they can support our staff morale and that goes a long way to improve our patients' experience."