Sydney health powerbroker moved as scandal swamps top hospital
One of NSW’s most powerful public hospital bosses, Teresa Anderson, has been moved aside amid controversies that have shaken the foundations of one of Sydney’s most prestigious hospitals.
One of NSW’s most powerful public hospital bosses, Teresa Anderson, has been moved aside amid controversies that have shaken the foundations of one of Sydney’s most prestigious hospitals.
Dr Anderson, a speech pathologist who has ruled the Sydney Local Health District for more than a decade, will be shifted from her job as chief executive at the end of May to lead a digital patient record implementation authority. It marks the finale in a culmination of controversies at the SLHD.
The SLHD is being sued by a young doctor who alleges she was relentlessly sexually harassed and touched by a senior cardiologist at the prestigious Centenary Institute, with allegations SLHD health bosses knew of the harassment, but failed to investigate it or discipline the cardiologist, and appointed him to a permanent staff specialist position at the time the matter was before court.
The cardiology professor allegedly sent the young doctor thousands of unwanted romantic and sexual text messages.
The permanent role would offer him significant protections from losing his job if there were adverse findings. Doctors at the health district were outraged at the move.
The Centenary Institute affair came in the midst of bitter infighting between senior surgeons in the RPA cardiology department, which had earlier been hit by claims by junior doctors of bullying and a toxic culture.
Dr Anderson was also at the centre of an earlier scandal, in which reports commissioned by the health district into the performance of a cardiothoracic surgeon involved in several adverse patient outcomes were buried.
The surgeon later had conditions placed on his registration and now practices in Victoria, but remained on the SLHD payroll for years after the regulatory action.
Insiders say a culture of cover-up had flourished at the SLHD under Dr Anderson, who was known for being a highly effective health leader adept at built internal empires that were under her personal control.
However complaints of unequal treatment were common in the public hospital district and those close to Dr Anderson would frequently be showered in resources, such as MRI machines and other equipment, while other departments withered on the vine.
Ian Wilcox, a cardiologist at RPA, said a “climate of fear” had flourished at the health district over the past decade. “This has been a 10-year journey of unhappiness in the hospital,” he said. “The discontent has been very deep.”
Discontent at the SLHD boiled to the surface last year when a highly unusual vote of no confidence in Dr Anderson was passed after a meeting of the medical council at Concord Hospital. After the drama, it emerged the hospital had a backlog of about 30,000 radiology scan referrals.
In a memo to Western Sydney Local Health District staff late on Thursday, health department secretary Susan Pearce announced Graeme Loy, chief executive of WSLHD, would act as SLHD chief executive from May 27. “I am very grateful to Graeme that he has agreed to act as chief executive of SLHD while recruitment for that role progresses,” she said.
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