Hospital work brings heavy wish-list plea

By ROSALEEN MacBRAYNE

Tauranga is lining up against Auckland and Wellington for a bigger share of health funding.

The Bay of Plenty District Health Board yesterday revealed its wish list for a $65 million redevelopment of the Tauranga Hospital campus to see it through another 20 years.

"We are struggling to meet the hospital needs of the people of the Bay of Plenty, and particularly Tauranga," Mary Hackett, who chairs the board, told local members of Parliament and council representatives.

"In another year or two we will not have the capacity to meet the demand."

A trend towards more day-stay procedures, improved safety, quality and patient privacy, and compliance with Health and Disability Services standards all had to be addressed.

The board will submit the second stage of a business plan to the Ministry of Health this week and is hoping for final approval in May. It would like the proposed three-year construction to start early in 2004 but concedes that may be optimistic.

Board chief executive Ron Dunham said the region's population growth was the unique component in the bid for more money, but there was only so much to go around and he did not want to raise community hopes.

Tauranga Hospital had "major capacity problems", and the board could not fund the redevelopment without Government help.

However, the Bay of Plenty expected to receive more cash under the population formula due to be announced this week.

Mr Dunham said the proposed improvements were calculated on today's prices, and any delay would increase costs.

A range of factors was increasing pressure on Tauranga Hospital facilities and services so that redevelopment of the campus was becoming more urgent each year.

The Western Bay of Plenty had one of the highest population growth rates in the country, and the large proportion of elderly people placed huge demands on healthcare.

He said many of Tauranga Hospital's clinical buildings were between 34 and 57 years old and needed renovation or replacement.

More operating and outpatient facilities were needed, as well as a reconfigured theatre suite, refurbished wards and more beds, upgrading and replacement of reticulated services, and improved transport access and parking.

It would cost $40 million to keep things going as they were and an estimated $213 million to build a whole new hospital, he said.

The preferred $65 million option would refurbish 13,700sq m of "basically good" buildings and add 10,200sq m of new buildings.

The maternity unit would be incorporated into the main block and the land it stands on now would be used for much-needed car parking. A helicopter pad would be put on the hospital campus near the emergency department.

Mr Dunham said the large project needed to be staggered, and the logistics of "carrying on business as usual" would have to be managed carefully.

Herald feature: Our sick hospitals