Modbury Hospital

Ms BEDFORD (Florey) (14:33): My question is to the Minister for Health. Minister, what information can you provide about doctors and the Modbury Hospital emergency department?

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING (Playford—Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Arts, Minister for Health Industries) (14:33): I would like to thank the member for Florey and acknowledge her dedication over many years on behalf of her electorate and people of the north-eastern suburbs when it comes to the Modbury Hospital. Recently there have been some inaccurate claims made about Modbury Hospital and its emergency department. Chief among those claims was that the Northern Adelaide Local Health Network is struggling to recruit doctors to work at the emergency department. This is simply not true.

While the emergency department has been dealing with the demands of a very difficult flu season, in terms of both patient presentations and higher sick leave taken by medical staff, there has been no issue in recruiting doctors to work at Modbury. In fact, there have been many more applicants than there have been positions available. I am told by the Northern Adelaide Local Health Network CEO, Jackie Hanson, that the emergency department just added three doctors to its staffing list in the last week and it expects to employ additional consultant level doctors in coming months.

Similar to other EDs across our metropolitan network, Modbury has been very busy and unfortunately we have seen this result in higher sick leave taken by doctors compared to last year. In response, SA Health has used locum medical staff to cover this shortfall as part of its winter demand strategy. I would like to thank the doctors, nurses, paramedics and staff across our system for their hard work and dedication during this very busy period.

For over 40 years, Modbury Hospital has been serving the north-eastern community, and I would like to assure the house that, with Transforming Health's investment, Modbury Hospital will continue to be an important part of our public hospital system for many years to come.