Bedford Orthopedic Center
Four million people. One hospital to serve adults and children with orthopedic trauma, bone and joint tuberculosis, congenital disorders, paralysis, infections, and more.
Bedford Orthopedic Center is the only public facility for orthopedic care in the Eastern Cape, providing the population with a crucial healthcare resource.
During apartheid, public hospitals in South Africa depended on scant public funds. Understaffed and ill-equipped, places like Beford fell decades behind and patients went untreated.
Thanks to the efforts of Dr. McConnachie, the African Medical Mission, and the hospital’s dedicated staff, a facility that once had a single operating room, outdated equipment, and no air-conditioning now has four operating theatres, a state-of-the-art spinal unit, and expanded programs including extensive outpatient services, radiology, emergency and trauma care, metabolic (scurvy, rickets), congenital (club foot, osteogenesis imperfecta), and infectious condition treatment, social services, and pediatric orthopedics. Rehabilitation services, including home visits by trained nurse practitioners and a craft program that helps patients retain mobility and earn income, maximize patients’ chances for a successful recovery.
But with over 20,000 outpatients served and nearly 3,000 procedures performed annually, the hospital still has critical needs in the areas of:
“Today the eyes of our nation are focused on a corner of our country, which was for too long left out on the margins. Nowhere has the legacy of apartheid been more shocking than in the state of health care in the former Transkei region.” Nelson Mandela at the opening of Bedford Orthopedic Center, 1996
