Northern Beaches Hospital inquiry reveals ‘disturbing number of clinical errors’
An inquiry into the Northern Beaches Hospital has heard how a patient was wrongly instructed not to be resuscitated, while claims of staff contracts being negotiated prior to the opening had alienated and angered medical specialists.
Manly
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A palliative care patient was wrongly instructed not to be resuscitated, an inquiry into Northern Beaches Hospital has heard.
Dee Why GP Dr Elena Roseth read a long list of incidents in which her patients had not had adequate treatment at Northern Beaches Hospital including one who had a ‘no resuscitation order’ attached to his records when it had not been discussed with him or his relatives.
She confirmed the daughter of the deceased person — who was receiving palliative care — had made a complaint about the incident.
“There has been a disturbing number of clinical errors,” she told the parliamentary hearing on Monday.
Dr Roseth said the number of reports of unsatisfactory treatment “seem to be markedly higher than prior to the opening of this hospital”.
However, Simon Woods, medical director at the hospital, told the Manly Daily they could find no record of a formal complaint of this nature, despite a thorough search of records.
“Without any specifics of this complaint it is very diffciult to respond to it,” Mr Woods said.
Other concerns raised during the hearing at the NSW Parliament’s Legislative Council, was that GPs were still not getting timely or compliant discharge summaries through for their patients, which was impacting on their care.
Dr Caroline Rogers, a GP from Narrabeen, said her practice had one patient sent home to die by Northern Beaches Hospital and the patient’s GP was not told and a discharge summary was not sent.
“We were never told by the hospital that the patient was going home, until the daughter came in with a hard copy of the discharge summary,” she said.
Dr Roseth said Healthscope has a policy that patients have to “opt in” to get a discharge summary sent to their GP, rather than “opt out” in public hospitals.
However, this was disputed by Mr Woods, who said from July patients had to “opt out” rather than “opt in”.
Meanwhile, there were also complaints about the ambulance service on the peninsula.
Dr Suzanne Daly, who is a GP in Newport, said a northern beaches toddler who had collapsed and was being given CPR by her grandfather waited 35 minutes for an ambulance.
She claimed at the inquiry, the ambulance service in the north of the peninsula was a lottery.
She said people were getting poorer health care since Northern Beaches Hospital opened, and called for the reopening of a level-three emergency department at Mona Vale Hospital.
She said the toddler in Bilgola Plateau waited for an ambulance to come from Balgowlah. Three arrived at once. The patient survived.
She said an ambulance could take 10 minutes or one hour and 10 minutes for those living in the north.
Dr Daly also claimed that staff at Northern Beaches Hospital had told one of her patients that ambulances were no longer taking cardiac patients to Northern Beaches Hospital and instead taking them straight to Royal North Shore Hospital.
She said the Frenchs Forest hospital was “not providing adequate treatment of stroke or heart attacks”, a claim backed up by Professor Richard West, who said private patients were getting access to some services in neurology and cardiovascular not available to public patients.
Fiona Davies, CEO of Australian Medical Association, NSW, told the inquiry Healthscope had also upset specialists by trying to negotiate their contracts just before the opening of the hospital.
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She said it ended up “alienating and angering people”.
She also said the way Healthscope embarked on the opening of the hospital and the resulting bad publicity which ensued was still impacting staff, although a recent survey suggested their satisfaction levels were now “mid-level”.