Doctors cancel gynaecology appointments, surgeries over safety fears

Dozens of women’s health appointments across the NSW Central Coast have been cancelled or postponed indefinitely after doctors said they could not guarantee the safety of patients due to chronic staff shortages.

Gynaecologists and obstetricians at Gosford and Wyong hospitals cancelled all non-urgent appointments on Tuesday, pledging to treat only urgent and life-threatening cases until Central Coast Local Health District hired more doctors to ease pressure on their “collapsing” department.

Doctors say women are waiting more than a year to see a gynaecologist or obstetrician at Gosford Hospital.

The decision caused further disruptions on Tuesday as thousands of nurses across the state walked off the job, forcing hospitals to cancel hundreds of planned surgeries.

Nine obstetricians and gynaecologists wrote to the Central Coast health district in July with an ultimatum that, if they did not boost staff numbers by last Friday, they would be forced to either resign, cancel non-urgent services or stop providing appointments at Wyong Hospital entirely.

After the deadline passed, the doctors wrote to colleagues across the health district saying they were left with no choice but to shut down non-urgent services at Gosford and all services at Wyong “to provide the greatest good for the most vulnerable”.

Central Coast obstetrician and gynaecologist Dr Helen Manning said the doctors did not want to shut down services.

“This decision has weighed heavily on us,” she said. “We have been forced into a position where we have to prioritise the safety of our community because we cannot guarantee that our patients will be safe when we have so few staff.”

Manning’s colleague Dr Kelly Hankins said waitlists for elective gynaecology services had ballooned over the past two years from 50 women waiting no longer than a month to 1400 women waiting more than a year.

“Women’s health should be taken seriously,” Hankins said. “We need the resources to care for women and babies on the Central Coast.”

Hankins and Manning are members of the doctor’s union the Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation (ASMOF) NSW, which supports the nine doctors’ concerns.

Chief executive Scott McLachlan said the health district would apologise for the inconvenience caused and was urgently seeking alternatives for patients affected by the cancellations. Hospital management was meeting the doctors to ensure all urgent and critical care could continue unaffected, McLachlan said.

“However, attracting and retaining the required workforce, especially doctors to regional areas, is a long-standing challenge for every state and territory across Australia,” he said.

It is the latest health district to feel the impact of staff shortages on women’s health and birthing services.

Health Minister Ryan Park told budget estimates on Tuesday workforce shortages were being felt particularly hard in regional and rural communities after Nationals MP Sarah Mitchell raised the case of a woman turned away from Tamworth Hospital despite being in labour and “several centimetres dilated”.

The woman’s partner drove her three hours to Maitland Hospital to give birth, Mitchell said.

Nurses and midwives demonstrating outside NSW Premier Chris Minns’ office in Kogarah on Tuesday. Credit: Janie Barrett

Thousands of midwives and nurses defied the Industrial Relations Commission and walked off the job for 12 hours on Tuesday, demanding a single-year 15 per cent pay rise.

Park told estimates the strike had forced hospitals to cancel “several hundred” planned surgeries.

Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.