Australian Medical Association WA president Michael Page has just spoken on Radio 6PR regarding the Floreat double-murder suicide tragedy two weeks ago.
WAtoday had last week revealed shooter Mark Bombara had a 10-centimetre cyst on his brain and was displaying aggressive behaviour to medical staff in the weeks before he used two of his 13 guns to kill Jennifer and Gretl Petelczyc.
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One health professional, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told WAtoday there should be a system in place for medical staff to be alerted if a patient acting in a dangerous manner had guns, or for them to alert police.
Michael Page said it was not reasonable for health professionals to alert police to patients acting aggressively.
“Erratic behaviour, emotional responses to what are often very traumatic experiences for patients in hospital are very, very common,” he said.
“Delirium can present with a range of features including agitation and even aggression ... the health workers and hospital staff know how to deal with these problems.
“If we as health professionals reported every patient who showed any sign of aggression whilst in hospital unwell, the police wouldn’t be able to do anything else other than follow up these mostly spurious leads.”
Page said medical professionals do, however, report it when a patient makes a direct or specific threat.
His comments come after Premier Roger Cook on Tuesday said: “If a health professional believes that a patient in front of them is either a danger to themselves, or a danger to someone else, that they must inform the police, and that’s always been the case.”