Patients’ rights discussed

Press, 16 November 1977, Page 15

Patients’ rights discussed

If hospital patients asked questions, then they must be answered, the chairman of the institutions committee of the North Canterbury Hospi-I tai Board (Mrs L. C. Gard-, iner) said on Monday. Mrs Gardiner was commenting during a discussion about the possibility of issuing a booklet to all patients, outlining their rights while in hospital. This had originally been suggested by the Canterbury Council for Civil Liberties, which had pointed to the success of a similar booklet, printed in Maori, English. Tongan. Samoan, Cook Island, and Niuean. Board members did not consider that a special booklet was needed for the North Canterbury area, but asked the hospital board administration to investigate the possibility of adding a new sec-1

l; tion to a handbook already ; l issued to patients. ■; Mrs Gardiner said she J agreed that further investigaItion urns needed about tne i rights of people once they I were in hospital, because: there were many areas where: patients were confused. “Hospitals are foreign to most people,” she said. , Dr R. C. S. Dick said he : was strongly against the idea of giving material to patients : which could lead to the need ' for detailed discussions with , them, particularly in the sur- > gical field. The possibility of the Hospital Board producing a new : booklet for admissions to the children’s ward was approved by the institutions committee, which emphasised that it was now almost six . years since an approach had been made to the Health Department to produce a new I edition of such a booklet. I