‘Health risk’ in some Chch wards

Press, 9 May 1979, Page 1

‘Health risk’ in some Chch wards

Health reporter

Large parts of Christchurch Hospital should be closed because they pose serious health risks to patients, says a visiting American medical expert, Professor Robert Zeppo. Professor Zeppo said yesterday that conditions which seemed to be accepted as normal at the hospital would not be tolerated in most other developed countries. Any United States hospital with such “disgraceful" conditions would be forced to close its doors. “The environment which patients have to put up with in this hospital is an offence to the dignity of people. Some may die because of it,” he said. But last evening the chairman of the North Canterbury Hospital Board

(Mr T. C. Grigg) said that buildings alone did not make a hospital. Board officers who went overseas reported that the hospital’s facilities compared with some of the best in the world, Mr Grigg said. Professor Zeppo, professor of surgery at the University of Miami, has been in Christchurch for three weeks lecturing to students and doctors at the hospital.

He listed overcrowded wards, lack of isolation areas, serious risks of infection, poor planning, and co-ordination of services, the practice of placing patients in beds in some hospital corridors, and the fire risks in old wards, as matters whicn demanded an outcry from a “suffering public." Professor Zeppo was

particularly critical of “the outdated conditions forced on patients” in the hospital’s orthopaedic wards.

These wards, so frequently used to cope with increasing pressures from motor accidents, were a disgrace, he said. “I cannot understand how they can do joint-replace-ment surgery and get away with it because of the risk of infection in such overcrowded wards.”

The hospital’s surgical and urological wards also were totally inadequate to meet the demands of modern patient care, he said. Professor Zeppo emphasised that the skill of doctors and nurses was not in question. “That they do so well is all the more amazing if you consider for a second the monumental problems

caused by the patient environment,” he said.

Professor Zeppo had harsh words about cue North Canterbury Hospital Board, which, he said, would never last a moment in the United States.

“The public should not put up with the secretive handling of their affairs by the board. I am all the more shocked by the fact that the board has not brought these problems out into the open,” he said. If Christchurch Hospital was any example, then the hospital board system in New Zealand “screamed out” for a challenge. The medical profession, too, had a responsibility to speak out when it saw the obvious problems at the hospital, Professor Zeppo said. “I would have thought

that on the Hospital Board there would be at least one member who would be filled with righteous indignation over what fellow citizens have to suffer here,” said Professor Zeppo. Mr Grigg said that the views of visiting medical professors were sought and respected. The board was fully aware of the need to improve operating theatres and wards, but buildings alone did not make a hospital service.

Cross-infection was one of the problems carefully monitored in every hospital, and the .board had specific staff to do this job.

“Unlike the hospital administrations in many states in the United States, the North Canterbury Hospital Board is elected by the people of

the local district. The news media are at all standing committee meetings of the board: at last month’s full board meeting 255 subjects were on the open agenda, and only 28 in committee,” Mr Grigg said.

The board was proud of its staff and had been seeking the advice of heads of departments on priorities for its rebuilding programme. Plans were well advanced to improve the old wards so they could be used for “a number” of years more.

Mr Grigg said that board officers who went overseas reported that facilities at the hospital compared with some of the best in the world. “The wards referred to have standards which are higher than those in some

of the well known and respected overseas hospitals,” he said, “Also, I understand that the United States has some of the best hospitals in the world, and some of the worst.”

Mr Grigg said he hoped that Professor Zeppo would convey his specific concerns to the board “through the proper channels.”

Mr J. W. Ardagh, chairman of surgical services for the Hospital Board, said last evening that he had the highest opinion of Professor Zeppo, but preferred to make no comment on his statements. Dr J. K. Laing, chairman of the Christchurch Hospitals’ Medical Staff Association, which represents about 150 specialists, said that he had no comment.