ED suggested for patient with history of cancers . . .

A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.

Opinion

In my opinion, we are losing the mainstays of a healthy society such as quality healthcare and good law and order.

The administrators in these areas claim that Covid, environmental problems and the general world situation are responsible for our knock-backs. They also say all is coming right. I say that is not so.

Take healthcare — lack of suitable staff at Gisborne Hospital is just about grinding colonoscopies, diagnosis of intestinal cancers, gastric cancers, etc to a standstill.

The situation must be wearing down staff who are publicly “keeping the faith” by constantly having to apologise for the rescheduling of colonoscopies, yet at the same time trying to maintain the myth that the departments are still functioning competently. I for one do not believe it.

Some of the relevant local hospital staff maintain the party line, out of loyalty, but my reading between the lines of what they say tells me that they would be happy to have the reality of the situation opened up to the public.

My ability to read from the periphery of what hospital staff are saying comes from my previous experience as a police prosecutor working in the courts. Behind the words hospital staff were uttering, I believe they were almost begging me to open the matter up to comment in the hope of “forcing” a solution from the politicians.

A local GP believes that a patient with a previous history of cancers has written to the hospital asking for a needed short-dated appointment. When it was suggested to the doctor that an acute situation was developing, they suggested the patient present themselves to the ED of the hospital for the diagnosis that might eventually save the patient’s life. A relevant hospital staff member agreed that an acute presentation at ED “. . . might be the only way”.

Some may dismiss me as a “stirrer”, but if things do go down “the tubes” there will be a lot of butt-covering, in my opinion, but hopefully also accountability.

Dennis Pennefather