Province's Chronic Medication Delivery Discussed in Washington DC | Western Cape Government

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Province's Chronic Medication Delivery Discussed in Washington DC

26 July 2012

Western Cape Minister of Health, Theuns Botha, and the head of Western Cape Government Health, Prof. Craig Househam met this week in Washington with representatives of UTI, the province's chronic medication service provider.

Minister Botha and Prof. Househam are in Washington for the World Aids Conference and capitalised on the opportunity to discuss the department's challenges with the packaging and distribution of chronic medication.

Minister Botha and Prof Househam outlined the significant challenges that have been experienced by the department since the inception of the contract. UTi acknowledged that they had underestimated the complexity of the data transfer and the technical challenges but they had committed significant resources to address the problems that had arisen. They confirmed that the issues related to the transfer of data have been resolved. They also indicated that by now all packages that are delivered, are repeat scripts and thus the error rate should dramatically reduce.

UTi committed to jointly address the damage caused to the reputation of the provincial government and their company as a result of the poor patient experience.

The Department undertook to look into the matter of the accuracy of prescriptions originating from health facilities, while UTi will look for resolutions to timely delivery of packages.

Minister Botha stressed his determination that the CDU contract should be extended to include the whole province and delivery of medication to sites closer to where people live, and ultimately home delivery of chronic medication. "We entered into a contract with an international company to enable Western Cape Government to provide home deliveries," stressed Minister Botha.

Media Enquiries: 

Hélène Roussouw
Tel: 021 483 4426
Cell: 082 771 8834
E-mail: Helene.Rossouw@westerncape.gov.za