Specialist doctor shortage: More than a third of adults not getting healthcare they need

The number of people turning up to emergency departments in life-threatening situations is growing.

By RNZ

More than a third of adult New Zealanders are not getting the healthcare they need, a new study by the senior doctors union has found.

Patients who need specialist care were being left “in limbo” with their GPs, while the number of people turning up to emergency departments in life-threatening situations is growing.

The report by the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists used official data including patient surveys, wait lists for non-surgical care and information about the number of people referred to a specialist but declined care.

About 1.75 million people were missing out on dental care, while 329,000 and 55,000 children were not getting the treatment they needed for mental health or addiction, it said.

The number of people who did not receive specialist care within four months was six times higher in September last year than in July 2019, it found.

In an editorial on the study in the New Zealand Medical Journal, the authors said that had big implications.

“As access to hospital specialists declines, growing numbers of patients are left in limbo under the care of their GPs, adding further to the pressures on access to primary care services, and risks patients’ condition deteriorating and quality of life worsening,” they said.

The report said the number of people turning up to hospital emergency departments has grown by 22 per cent in the nine years to 2023.

And the proportion of them arriving with immediately or potentially life-threatening conditions has grown from a half to two-thirds, it said.

The union said the situation was much worse than in comparable European countries and urgent investigations were needed.

It said any change needed to be much wider than just the health system, addressing the problems that could contribute to bad health including poverty.