Cancer flight the first, says HFA

By KEVIN TAYLOR

A Waikato cancer patient is the first New Zealander to have gone to Australia for radiotherapy treatment, says the Health Funding Authority.

The patient left New Zealand in the last fortnight for the treatment, which will cost the taxpayer at least $10,000.

Health Waikato acting oncology manager Wayne Little said the cost was no more than for a patient from outside Hamilton coming to Waikato Hospital for radiotherapy.

The hospital had been forced to offer the option to some patients because of a long waiting list for radiotherapy. Other hospitals offering radiotherapy in New Zealand also have lengthy waiting times.

A new radiotherapy machine is being installed at Waikato Hospital, but will not be ready until January.

The hospital is also looking to recruit four more radiation therapists and a radiation oncologist.

Cancer Society acting chief executive Roger Taylor said it was preferable cancer patients were treated at their nearest centre, and flights to Australia should not be happening.

"Quite obviously if the condition is treatable in New Zealand, then it's preferable they are treated [here]."

The society would be disturbed if treatment in Australia became a trend.

The HFA said flying patients to Australia was only a temporary option until the new machine was operating. Its spokeswoman Emily Bishop said the patient was the first the HFA knew of that had gone to Australia for such treatment.

Mr Little would release no details of the patient. The patient is getting radiotherapy at a private Brisbane hospital and will be in Australia for six to seven weeks.

Mr Little said the more patients that went to Australia, the less pressure there would be on waiting times for treatment at Waikato Hospital.

The nationally recommended maximum waiting time for radiotherapy was four weeks, but patients were now waiting up to eight weeks at the hospital.