Hospital patients face long delays

Auckland City Hospital. Photo / Herald on Sunday

Strike action will affect Auckland City Hospital's adult emergency department from Friday morning.

The strike, organised by the Association of Professional and Executive Employees (Apex), will start at 7am and go through to 7am on Tuesday, March 30.

It will cause delays in the adult emergency department as well as the postponement of some elective surgery.

The action involves medical radiation technologists (MRTs).

Deputy chief medical officer at Auckland Hospital Dr Margaret Wilsher said there were two key points.

"First, it's not business as usual. We have very limited capacity for those who require x-rays."

She said the strike would affect all other patients needing an x-ray or scan as well as meaning flow-on delays for many other patients.

If a vital organ or limb was threatened, patients would receive x-rays, otherwise the hospital would stabilise the fracture without x-ray or arrange for an x-ray at a private hospital.

"We don't need to be x-raying people unless they really need it."

Dr Wilsher asked anyone not in a life-threatening situation but who thinks they may require hospital care to first contact Healthline on 0800 611-116 or their general practitioner for advice.

There would be "considerable delays" for anyone needing emergency treatment, said Dr Wilsher, but she could not comment on how long people could expect to be delayed.

"The delays will depend on how many people need help."

Some elective surgery had also been postponed and would resume after March 30. The affected patients had been informed.

Dr Wilsher would not comment on the cause of the strikes other than to say they were the result of a "failure to reach an agreement in negotiations".

Apex national secretary Dr Deborah Powell said the union had been bargaining for a national collective employment agreement with DHBs for about a year now.

She warned that this was the start of escalating industrial action but could not comment on the details.

"We believe we should get a cost-of-living increase. The DHB have started at zero and they're still at zero, and they agree there has been a 10 to 15 per cent productivity increase by MRIs."

Dr Powell said funding for DHBs had increased by 3.2 per cent, but they were not prepared to pass that on to the workers.