Victims of Queensland’s ‘broken’ health system share their stories

A Qld woman who’s been waiting 520 days for a common procedure has revealed the heartbreaking reason she only showers once a fortnight.

A woman who says she has been waiting a staggering 520 days for both hips to be replaced is in so much pain she can only get to her bathroom to shower once a fortnight.

Patricia Clayton, a 57-year-old restricted to a wheelchair, shared her plight at Queensland parliament on Thursday to highlight the shortfalls in the state’s “broken healthcare system”.

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Patricia Clayton speaking with shadow health spokeswoman Ros Bates and Opposition Leader David Crisafulli.

She said she was supposed to have surgery on Wednesday but this was pushed back again earlier in the week because of a shortage of sterilisation equipment.

Mrs Clayton said she was now scheduled to have surgery in June and admitted to suicidal thoughts because of the unbearable pain.

She said she only showered once a fortnight because she had so much difficulty accessing the bathroom on the second level of her home.

“I would like the government to realise people are suffering,” she told reporters.

“They’re helpless and they can’t reach out for help because there’s no one there to listen.”

Mrs Clayton said she reached out to shadow health spokeswoman Ros Bates for help in desperation because she was in “despair, absolute despair”.

“If I can’t get help I don’t see the point in living anymore — my hips are broken, they’ve been broken since June last year.

“I’m broken, I lost my job, I lost my life, I don’t have a life, I have no social life, no friends and I was desperate.”

Patricia Clayton, 57, outside Queensland Parliament.

Another woman, Catherine Santagiuliana, said her dad was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia last September and given three to 6 months to live.

She said he suffered a dislodged cannula following a routine blood transfusion in October and waited two hours for an ambulance before being ramped at the Redlands Hospital carpark.

He was eventually prescribed take home an antibiotic pack through a drip and told to come back the next day.

“Dad said he would rather sit under a tree and die than come back to that hospital,” Mrs Santagiuliana said.

He refused to return and had the cannula replaced by an at-home nurse the next day but his daughter said “this is when I feel dad gave up the will to live”.

“He passed away on October 31,” she said.

Opposition Leader David Crisafulli said resourcing was an issue in the health sector and demanded cultural change.

“In the case of the ED (emergency department), it’s a case of better triaging, being open and honest with data, be transparent so that our frontline staff know where to go and how to treat people,” Mr Crisafulli said.