And the provincial department of health - aware of the discrimination - has done nothing about the situation.
The claims were made by the King Kidney Forum, and East London renal failure sufferer Alister Kriel.
Department of health spokesman Sizwe Kupelo said on Tuesday (27 September 2011) the institution was forced to cater for younger people.
"Dialysis is a big problem in the province. There are a number of people requiring it and there is a protocol that must be followed. Generally, this protocol gives younger people preference," he said.
Frere and Cecilia Makiwane hospitals cater for renal failure sufferers.
Kupelo said no one was turned away and the issue was not that simple. "It is a clinical protocol we are forced to follow. We would not do it on purpose," he said.
All the patients belonging to the forum - who are over the age of 50 - said they were forced to find an alternative dialysis centre once they reached the half-century mark. Kriel said he had suffered the same fate earlier this year.
And this is not the first time the forum, based in King William's Town, has raised the issue. A story was initially published in the Daily Dispatch on July 16 2010.
The 50-strong group was started by its current chairman, Monde Dambuza, to garner more support for people with kidney failure.
The forum's main focus is the department's failure to cater for older patients who suffer from kidney problems.
But it seems they have made no headway in the past year. Dambuza, who lives in Bhisho, said yesterday they had still not received a response from the department after the first article was published.
"We have been fighting this for over a year but no one bothers to listen. They just don't care. No one explains anything. They just chase you away at the centres," he said. "Even if they could help, sometimes they don't even look at us when we go there. Because of this I stopped going."
Dialysis is the artificial process of getting rid of waste and unwanted water from the blood.
It is used as a renal failure treatment for people who have lost kidney function.
Sufferers are required to have four-hour sessions three times week at a cost of no less than R1500 a session in the private sector.
"I am forced to rely on my son because the state does not care. He was forced to take out a medical aid for me just to keep me alive," said Dambuza, who was diagnosed with renal failure in 2008.
Kriel, who has suffered renal failure since 2008, lost his medical aid benefit when his teaching position was terminated earlier this year.
"I went to a public hospital for the first time this year but was turned away because I am older than 50. I was basically sent home to die. It is discrimination and there is no other way to describe it," he said.
Source: Daily Dispatch
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