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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-07-10 Daily Xml
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COUNTRY HOSPITALS

Mrs VLAHOS (Taylor) (14:44): My question is to the Minister for Health and Ageing. Can the minister update the house on the status of surgery at the Balaklava Soldiers Memorial Hospital and other country hospitals?

The Hon. J.D. HILL (Kaurna—Minister for Health and Ageing, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Arts) (14:44): I thank the member for Taylor for her question. As members would expect, I imagine, Country Health SA regularly reviews country hospitals to make sure that the hospitals meet standards, and we do that and they do that in order to protect the health and safety of the patients who are cared for in those hospitals.

As part of a statewide program of review, sterilisation services are currently being reviewed in all public hospitals in country South Australia. Of all public hospitals to date, 26 of the 32 country hospitals where surgery is performed have been reviewed, and the remaining six are expected to be reviewed by the end of August, the end of next month.

Out of the hospitals reviewed to date, five were identified as having issues with noncompliance with standards, and Country Health is addressing those issues. The review also confirmed a number of noncompliances against standards, in particular Balaklava Soldiers Memorial Hospital, both with the sterilising process and with equipment, and consequently surgical services have been temporarily suspended at that hospital.

Country Health SA is working towards surgical services resuming at the hospital in August when sterilisation will occur at Clare, and equipment will be transported to Balaklava. No other country hospital is facing across the board suspension of surgical services. I take it from that advice that all the other services are either compliant or close to being compliant, other than the half a dozen or so that are yet to be inspected.

It is incumbent, of course, on the Department for Health and Ageing to take action where there are concerns about patient safety. I am sure that I would be challenged and questioned if that were not the case. I was interested, therefore, to hear that the opposition health spokesperson claimed over the weekend that the justifications for suspending surgery at Balaklava were weak.

It is regrettable that a politician seeks to politicise what is a clinical process of judgement about safety and quality in hospitals. It is a cavalier and reckless approach to patient safety. If that is an indicator of how the Liberals in government would run public hospitals, then patients should be very wary indeed.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

The Hon. J.D. HILL: In relation to Balaklava, 62 procedures were performed at the hospital in 2011 by one orthopaedic surgeon and one plastic surgeon. Country Health is supporting patients to temporarily reschedule their surgery at Clare, which is a relatively short distance away, and is working with the community passenger network to provide assistance with travel when required.

I wish to assure the community that this temporary suspension affects only the operating theatre. Balaklava Soldiers Memorial Hospital remains open, despite other claims that have been made, and there is absolutely no intention to close the hospital or any other public country hospital. An amount of $728.5 million has been provided for country public health services in the 2012-13 calendar, and that is 91.5 per cent more than when we took office in 2002.

The state government is committed to providing more health services close to home for country residents, and that includes more elective surgery—and we have seen more elective surgery—more chemotherapy, more renal dialysis and more mental health care to reduce the burden of travel for patients living in the country.

Just to repeat: the Balaklava hospital will have its services restored I understand in August once the equipment and the sterilisation processes have been fixed to the level that is equivalent to safe service delivery. I commend my departmental officers who go about the business of ensuring that services are delivered in a safe way, for not being pressured to do something which might have been easier to manage publicly, but to do the thing that would put the interests of patients at the very top.

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