More give up smoking but still below target

More patients at Rotorua and Taupo hospitals are being helped to give up smoking but the district health board is below other health targets.

Lakes District Health Board's latest health targets have revealed a 98 per cent success rate in giving support to patients who smoke.

The national target is 95 per cent. In the previous quarter the result was 96 per cent.
Smokefree team leader Pip King said the smoking target had now been achieved "for a long time" and the result was "commendable, especially given that Lakes DHB has a much
higher number of smokers than nationally".

For the first time the primary care smoking target has been achieved, rising from 86 per cent last quarter to 92.

The quarterly health targets had a slight drop in the eight-month old immunisation target for the health board and the board has now fallen to the bottom of the table for the shorter stays in Emergency Department (ED) target, down from 92 per cent last quarter to 90 per cent.

Chief executive Ron Dunham said a number of the health target results were disappointing, for everyone involved. He said the shorter stays in ED target was proving especially hard to achieve, and in part it could be seen as a reflection of the number of acute presentations to ED.

Ministry of Health clinical champion for this target, Dr Angela Pitchford, recently spent a full day meeting with staff across the range of services.

There was a slight improvement on the new faster cancer treatment target, but at 52 per cent was still well below the target for 85 per cent of patients to receive their first cancer treatment, orother management, within 62 days of being referred with a high suspicion of cancer.

Lakes District Health Board Quarter 4 results
• Smoking cessation advice: target 95 per cent, 98 per cent
achieved

• Eight-month-old immunisation: target 95 per cent, 92 per
cent achieved

• Shorter stays in the emergency department: target 95 per
cent, 90 per cent achieved

• Improved access to elective surgery: target 100 per cent,
108 per cent achieved

• Faster cancer treatment: target 85 per cent, 52 per cent
achieved

• More heart and diabetes checks: target 90 per cent,
achieved 87 per cent