Napier Health Centre was established to provide services in the wake of the closure of the hilltop Napier Hospital more than 25 years ago, to reimagine Fallen Soldiers Memorial Hospital in Hastings as a regional hospital.
In a statement released to Hawke’s Bay Today late on Tuesday, Health NZ Hawke’s Bay group director operations David Warrington said: “There will be continuity despite the change in after-hours, and as soon as we have worked through this process with our staff, we will be communicating what services will be in place from March 1.
“Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora is committed to ensuring the Napier community can access sustainable urgent care services after-hours and in the weekends,” he said.
It has been in discussions with partners, including contracted community health provider Health Hawke’s Bay PHO, along with other local healthcare providers and community leaders, on urgent care provision in “the area”.
“We have been discussing a proposal with our staff on potential changes to our after-hours nurse-led overnight service,” he said.
“We need to take a new approach to ensure we can continue to deliver an overnight service.”
He said Health NZ is also exploring options with Health Hawke’s Bay on how different models of care can be contracted “depending on the outcome of the consultation with our staff”.
“While we understand this is not ideal for our community, who want an update on any potential service changes, we cannot predetermine the outcome of the change proposal,” he said.
“We are committed to providing a service to the community, there will be continuity despite the change in after-hours, and as soon as we have worked through this process with our staff, we will be communicating what services will be in place from March 1.”
The situation this week provoked Napier Mayor Kirsten Wise into speaking-out on the issue, saying in a Hawke’s Bay Today Talking Point: “What is not acceptable is the decline in healthcare we are seeing in Napier.”
Highlighting the situation that was most graphically illustrated when road and rail routes in and out of Napier were severed in Cyclone Gabrielle two years ago – cutting off a city of more than 60,000 people “bordered by rivers and the sea” – she said: “We are consistently sidelined when it comes to provision of services by Te Whatu Ora.
“To use a well-worn metaphor, we don’t need an ambulance at the bottom of a hill, we need community and out-patient services that are easily accessible for our residents when and where they need them,” she said.
“This may include the use of new technology and new ways of working, and certainly adaptations like tele-health may be part of that,” she wrote, but having first heard of intended change via sources outside Health NZ, she said: “Most importantly we need constructive conversations before decisions of this calibre, which directly affect our people, are made.
“Cyclone Gabrielle showed us we need local solutions and providing them takes a joined-up approach from leadership,” she said.
“It’s illogical and irresponsible to make big change without talking to the people those changes directly impact.”
Meanwhile, the Public Service Association, New Zealand’s largest trade union, claims that while new Minister of Health Simeon Brown pushes for more “Telehealth” services, Health NZ is actually proposing to “cut Telehealth support roles to meet the Government’s drive to reduce spending”.
PSA acting national secretary Fleur Fitzsimons claimed this week the cuts would reduce access to virtual healthcare and delay vital diagnosis and treatment.
The proposed cuts are part of an overall 47% cut to Data and Digital services under a Health NZ restructuring proposal announced in November, she said.
The Health Centre building had been leased space until bought by Health NZ last year.
Doug Laing is a senior reporter based in Napier with Hawke’s Bay Today, and has 52 years of journalism experience, 42 of them in Hawke’s Bay, in news gathering, including breaking news, sports, local events, issues, and personalities.
