Doctors contact Hazzard over Canterbury Hospital’s ‘Third World conditions’
Doctors at a hospital in Sydney’s booming south-west have described horrifying conditions as they beg the health minister for an upgrade.
NSW
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Sixty senior doctors have penned a scathing letter to Health Minister Brad Hazzard calling out “Third World conditions”, “inadequate facilities” and “grossly inadequate non-clinical space” at Canterbury Hospital.
In the letter, sent to Mr Hazzard on Christmas Eve, the doctors said their “overwhelming concern remains the risk to patients as their number increases and … capacity to serve them safely diminishes”.
The Daily Telegraph has spoken to one of the doctors who authored the letter and who also separately said the maternity ward resembled a Third World country.
The letter also cites examples of specialist doctors forced to access a computer and desk on a “first-come first-served basis”, and leaving people to sit in open hallways.
“We are bursting at the seams. The maternity ward is like something out of Bangladesh. It doesn’t have an area large enough to contain the women who are waiting,” the doctor said.
“Nobody has any private space. They share a common large room where they go from one corner of the room to the other. They are asked about their weight, their past pregnancies. There is no privacy.”
NSW Health responded that the hospital had met many of its targets including timely emergency department treatment.
“The latest independent report from the Bureau of Health Information shows that four in five patients (80.4 per cent) started their treatment on time at Canterbury Hospital’s emergency department during October to December 2020,” a spokeswoman said.
Mr Hazzard asked NSW Health Secretary Elizabeth Koff to respond to the letter and in her response Ms Koff said the redevelopment of the languishing hospital was “priority 2” according to the Sydney Local Health District.
“In March 2019, the NSW Government committed $750 million to the RPA (Royal Prince Alfred) development, noting that this was the District’s highest priority, with the project commencing new works in the 2020-21 Budget,” the spokeswoman added.
It is understood the government is conscious of the region’s growing needs and attempting to support them through the $1.3b funding investment in nearby Bankstown Hospital.
Labor Leader Jodi McKay described the conditions of the hospital as “shocking” and “appalling”.
“It’s disgraceful to think that 60 doctors have to beg the Minister to show an interest in his woefully under-resourced public hospital,” she said.
Doctors have argued the government response is not good enough — citing the area’s booming population evident by the 50,000 presentations through the emergency department, managed by 170 beds in the hospital.
The population accessing the hospital were described as the “poorest of the poor”, including a strong refugee population, with high and complicated health needs.
“There is so much pressure to keep churning people over. We have an intensive care unit with 12 beds and just two shared bathrooms ... (that includes) an isolation room for people with infectious diseases,” the doctor said.
Labor MP Sophie Cotsis has relentlessly campaigned for the hospital: “I’m sick and tired of this Government treating my community like second-class citizens.”
Mr Hazzard was unavailable for comment.
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