16 May 2012

Making it up as they go along with elective surgery

| johnboy
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The Liberals Jeremy Hanson has the worrying news that process seems to have broken down for elective surgery:

70 per cent of the Canberra Hospital’s elective surgery admission requests are not properly authorised, according to information obtained by the Canberra Liberals. ACT Shadow Health Minister Jeremy Hanson said a Freedom of Information request shows that the ACT Labor Government has failed to act on a damning 2011 Auditor General finding that there are ‘ad hoc processes for managing the waiting lists.’

“According to an internal Canberra Hospital audit, seven of the ten audited request for admission forms weren’t signed by either the patient or the surgeon, in a serious breach of procedure,” Mr Hanson said today.

“Katy Gallagher has clearly failed to act on the Auditor General’s warning last year that there were serious deficiencies in elective surgery management, and she should now explain why.

We hope, if they are making it up as they go along, that no money is changing hands to bump up the lists.

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mouldy said :

I absolutely agree with you that 2 years is entirely too long to wait for elective surgery and that TCH’s systems need to be reviewed and revised. However…surely in 2 years you could well have saved up the required money for the surgery and then had that surgery done at your own cost? This would also help the over burdened public health system.

My current surgery is the 2nd of 2 hip replacements. The first procedure was done 2 years ago, and I was promised that as the first procedure wasnt effective until the 2nd was done, that my waiting time wouldnt be great. Unfortunately, Ive heard private costs for joint replacements can exceed 15k, and even 2 years of my Disability Pension would barely cover that, assuming Id not spend any of it anywhere else for 2 years.

I absolutely agree with you that 2 years is entirely too long to wait for elective surgery and that TCH’s systems need to be reviewed and revised. However…surely in 2 years you could well have saved up the required money for the surgery and then had that surgery done at your own cost? This would also help the over burdened public health system.

Ive been on the waiting list for just over 2 years now for elective surgery that my surgeon told me would occur within 3 months.
After Id heard nothing after 3 months, I called to find what was happening, to be told that my admission form had been lost somewhere and would need to be resubmitted.
I contacted them several times and even had a followup consultation with my surgeon at the 12 month mark, I was told I was still on the list but noone could suggest how much longer the wait would be.

The fact that some documents are missing a signature or two, barely seems to surprise me.

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