Page 3050 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 23 September 2014
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This is the system that health minister Katy Gallagher has delivered to the people of the ACT. The longest serving health minister in the country has the worst record in the country. She blithely states that she spends more but refuses to acknowledge that the people of the ACT get less because this government has got its healthcare priorities wrong.
It is with great respect that I acknowledge the staff who work in this system—a system that lets them down, a system that does not allow them to do what they studied long and hard for and constantly review their skills, a system designed by this minister, with wrong priorities, that is not only letting the patients of the ACT down but letting the staff down and putting the staff under increasing and unacceptable pressure. Ultimately it is the staff at the front line who care so much and who give so much who will feel this—after the patients, who will feel it the most.
What did the ED clinical director say? He said that tough decisions are needed. The article continued:
In light of the enormous strain on the hospital, Dr Hall has urged the ACT Government to make tough political decisions and cut elective care.
He said that the importance of the government getting its healthcare priorities right for ACT residents is that we will actually get better outcomes in that people will get seen faster, there will be fewer complications, their health will improve much more quickly and we will have, by the doctor’s own words, less mortality. The article also said:
He said the hospital could also be more efficient by ensuring more of its services operated on a 24-hour, 7-days-a-week model, with more services offered out of hours, maximising the unused capacity of the hospital’s resources.
“If you have 10 full operating theatres in daytime hours you have two choices,” he said.
“You either build two new operating theatres or you use operating theatres for extended hours as a sense of efficiency.”
These are the issues that we face.
Canberra Hospital’s deputy director Ian Thompson said that they had looked at the AMA’s 85 per cent target for occupancy and it was based on a best practice model for efficient flow of patients through the hospital. Surely, if our priorities are right, we would be working towards delivering a best practice model for efficient flow of patients through the hospital. The article said:
Mr Thompson said officials have been examining the hospital data and were considering more research to better understand what was driving such high patient numbers.
The government did offer some relief if a patient was on the way, with 27 extra beds opening during the week of the interview. The article said:
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