Women's and Children's Hospital

The Hon. C. BONAROS (15:34): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking a question of the Minister for Health and Wellbeing.

Leave granted.

The Hon. C. BONAROS: I have been advised that the Women's and Children's Hospital is about to undergo a mandatory independent accreditation audit as part of SA Health's assessment of all public healthcare services across the state which, I understand, commenced last month. That accreditation scheme operates every three years against the National Safety and Quality Health Service Standards, developed by the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care.

Part of that process is testing whether the relevant systems are in place and working effectively to provide the expected standard of patient safety and quality. A number of benchmarks are tested as part of that. My questions to the minister are:

1. Can the minister confirm when the audit will occur at the Women's and Children's Hospital?

2. Is the minister confident that the hospital will pass the assessment?

3. Will the minister undertake to make public the results of that assessment?

4. Can the minister detail what other public hospital and healthcare services have been assessed to date and whether any have failed that process?

The Hon. S.G. WADE (Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (15:36): I will certainly take the honourable member's question on notice, but the advice I have received is that there are no current accreditations underway for South Australian public hospitals under the National Safety and Quality Health Service Standards. However, I will certainly take the honourable member's questions on notice and bring back an answer.