KEY POINTS:
Auckland's three district health boards have proposed building the first of the Government's new elective surgery "Super Centres" at Greenlane Hospital.
Health Minister Tony Ryall said today the four operating theatres would be the first cluster in his plan for a total of 20 new elective surgery theatres, promised by the Government before the election.
"The Auckland DHBs have taken up the challenge to urgently submit a proposal to build the first Super Centre complex as a regional project," he said.
"A formal business case will now be prepared."
The 20 new theatres will cost about $180 million. The Ministry of Health expects it would be three to four years before they were all delivering services.
Mr Ryall said the Government had inherited a crisis in health, particularly in elective surgery.
"There wasn't the capacity in the health sector to do the operations," he said.
"Elective surgery under the previous government didn't even keep up with population growth, let alone population aging."
The 20 new operating theatres and 800 extra staff were essential measures, he said.
Mr Ryall's other priority is hospital waiting lists and he has "opened the books" on the system used by DHBs.
"Labour failed to enable people to get access to the specialists they need to see before they can have an operation or get other treatment (surgical first specialist assessments)," he said.
"Ministry reports confirm that access to specialist appointments has declined in real terms even more seriously than elective surgery," he said.
"The population grew by 9.6 per cent but the people getting to see specialists increased by only 0.7 per cent."
Mr Ryall said his investigation had revealed DHBs had been placing patients in "planned and staged" categories.
"We've got potentially 11,000 people who aren't on the official waiting lists because they've been put in this category," he told NZPA.
"What that does is remove them from the compliance lists - the waiting lists that are reported to the Ministry of Health - and it allows them to get the green light for their performance."
Mr Ryall said the reports showed huge discrepancies in the number of patients DHBs had put on the "planned and staged" lists.
"When it's ranging from 2 per cent at one DHB to 45 per cent at another, you get the impression there's something going on," he said.
"We're investigating that...some heart patients have been put in this category and forgotten about."
Mr Ryall said he was going to sort out the waiting lists.
"We want something that people can rely on and is upfront."
- NZPA
