Page 2299 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 29 August 2007
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
That was what he said on ABC radio on 24 August 2007. We are still waiting for an explanation, as indeed we are waiting for an explanation to be given to another family whose father’s care was compromised due to lack of equipment and supplies. What appears to be indisputable is that these incidents happened and no amount of explaining will take away from that.
We will move on to the serious issue of infection control issues. On the back of Professor Peter Collignon, director of the infectious diseases unit and microbiology at Canberra Hospital, raising concerns about the need to improve infection controls, a registered nurse, Louise Wright, has been dismissed by The Canberra Hospital, supposedly for poor time keeping, not being a team player and something called “vertical bullying” when she raised her voice to a superior. It appears that the registered nurse had angered hospital authorities by raising concerns about management and infection controls. According to Ms Wright, a nurse with many years experience, she sought advice from the hospital’s infection control unit after a patient suffering a gastro-intestinal infection resistant to antibiotic treatment was placed in the day surgery admission unit, in an alcove in the same room as 12 to 15 patients awaiting surgery. This bacteria, called VRE, is highly contagious and active for lengthy periods on surfaces, including clothing. Its effects are debilitating and the risk was heightened by the affected patient having diarrhoea.
Ms Wright sought advice and was advised that the infection control requirement was for nursing of such a patient to be done by a single nurse in a single room with a door and with another nurse to act as a runner for supplies. While the patient was later moved to a corner in a neighbouring recovery area, it was still not an isolated room. Ms Wright told Stateline there were no single rooms in the area. The hospital has denied any breach of clinical protocol.
I have called on The Canberra Hospital and the minister to reinstate the sacked nurse, Louise Wright. It is not good enough to arrange a so-called counselling session with a letter of termination in hand, ready to present to the person being counselled. Another nurse has also told me that she has been campaigning for a couple of years for proper processes for dealing with patients with infectious diseases. At issue has been the lack of proper isolation areas for patients with infectious diseases. Surely, isolation units should be a necessity, not a luxury.
Let us not shoot the messengers. The hospital system needs skilled staff, so I am appealing to the hospital to reinstate Ms Wright and take on board the concerns with management of infectious diseases control. It has taken an enormous amount of courage for the nurses to speak out. This is the health minister’s chance to take constructive action to deal with all of the problems identified by the nurses.
Looking at staff allocation, I have been told that there are many trained nursing staff who want to work in the hospital system but refuse to do so in the current climate of management. That is supported also by the ANF. The matters of staffing are far worse than the government or the health department are admitting, according to nurses, who are stretched beyond reasonable limits to care for patients because of administrative and organisational failures. Nurses say they feel demoralised, devalued and unappreciated. Nurses believe that there is a great deal of “budget before bodies” and .
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .