Question Time

Paediatric Cochlear Implant Program

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS (Black—Leader of the Opposition) (14:03): My question is to the Premier. Can the Premier guarantee that all families of children impacted by the cochlear implant program at the Women's and Children's Hospital have now been contacted; if not, why not? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain.

Leave granted.

The Hon. D.J. SPEIRS: Page 24 of the External Governance Review—Cochlear Implant Program states:

Families of 69 children that were part of the Paediatric [Cochlear Implant] program from 2006 were not contacted during the review

The Hon. C.J. PICTON (Kaurna—Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (14:04): I am very happy to address this very serious issue in terms of the paediatric cochlear implant report and the issue that has happened at the Women's and Children's Hospital. As we announced last week, the government, the Premier and I released an external governance report that was undertaken in relation to that program. There were a number of issues identified in terms of the mapping of cochlear implants that had happened in that program.

This report really identified the extent to which this has been an issue, whereby we now need to go back up to 17 years to look at each of those cases that potentially could have been affected by undermapping in that program. That's obviously a very significant time period. While this is, in the overall scheme of the health system, a small number of patients, when you look over 17 years it becomes a significant number of patients who potentially have been impacted by that.

The government have announced a range of responses in relation to that report. We are offering initial ex gratia payments to families who have been impacted. We are accepting all the recommendations that have been made from the external governance report, and we are setting up a number of supports to assist families in relation to providing assistance not only in terms of those ex gratia payments but other assistance that may be needed, as well as setting up external independent advocacy that can assist patients and their families through this process.

We are also setting up an oversight body, which will be led by the former Chief Medical Officer of Australia and South Australia, Professor Chris Bagley, to ensure that all those recommendations are implemented. In relation to the specific number, over 200 patients are identified. As the report outlines, and as the member has quoted, there were a number of attempts to locate patients that have not been successful. The other issue, as the report identifies, is that we need to go back and identify patients who are over the age of 18. That is a key part of the work that needs to happen now.

We want to identify every possible patient we can, not only to offer them support, but also the other element of the program which is still underway is that we have an external clinical review that is underway by a New South Wales not-for-profit organisation called NextSense that undertake this mapping work for New South Wales Health. They are offering that support to all the people affected. That is a key recommendation, that we need to make sure that all those people have the opportunity to be offered that support, to review these particular maps for each individual child, and now in some cases they are adults, to identify if there were any particular issues in terms of the mapping of each of those people.

In addition, we have also put in place not only social media but advertising in the press to see if anyone else can come forward we may not have been able to identify. We are doing everything possible to make sure that we can identify and support and have an assessment done of each and every one of those members going back the 17 years of the length of that program.

Of course, the other element worth noting is there are broader recommendations in this report that go to two areas; one is in terms of making sure that the systems in place, not only at the Women's and Children's Hospital but across SA Health, are improved, and also there are national implications as well.