Operating theatres shut to save cash as thousands of Australians wait for surgery

Hospitals are closing operating theatres to doctors wanting to perform planned surgery for up to a third of the year to save money, despite there being almost 70,000 people on NSW waiting lists. Nepean Hospital surgeon Richard Hanney said the hospital suspended planned surgery for around 12 weeks each year, including breaks over Christmas, Easter and other school holidays. Also, surgeons were expected to give up a day's worth of operating every two months to make room for more emergency surgery. As a result, some doctors who were available to do one list a week for 52 weeks were getting into the theatres for only 35 weeks a year.

The most recently available figures show that last September there were 2524 people waiting for planned surgery at Nepean, including 762 who had waited for more than a year. Dr Hanney, a member of the board of the NSW branch of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, said it was hard to work out just how long the state's teaching hospitals were closed to planned surgery, because each hospital restricted it in different ways. For example, aside from holiday shutdowns, the Royal North Shore Hospital ceases to perform elective surgery after 3pm each day.

The president of the NSW branch of the Australian Medical Association, John Gullotta, said an AMA phone survey showed some of Sydney's teaching hospitals had increased their holiday shutdowns since 2002. It revealed the Prince of Wales Hospital ceased performing elective surgery for four weeks over the 2002 holiday season. The hospital will do likewise this year but for six weeks from December 19. Dr Gullotta said he did not believe there was any reason to stop performing planned surgery except on the major public holidays.

The Opposition health spokesman, Barry O'Farrell, yesterday attacked the State Government for allowing elective surgery operating times to be cut while waiting lists were so high. "There are currently 65,348 people waiting for elective surgery in NSW. More than 9000 have been waiting over a year," he said. "There is no doubt that waiting lists would be reduced if the Carr Government showed a greater commitment to funding surgery times."

Representatives of three area health services contacted by the Herald yesterday said that the holiday suspension of elective surgery was to give staff and surgeons time off. As well, they said, patients preferred not to have surgery during peak holiday periods. Nurses upset over staffing shortages at Maitland Hospital have closed 26 beds. The nurses carried out their threat of industrial action after representatives of the NSW Nurses Association met the Hunter Area Health Service's Reasonable Workloads Committee to ask for extra staff. It is believed to be the first time such action has been taken by nurses in NSW. Four of the paediatrics ward's 14 beds, four of the medical ward's 34 beds and eight of the surgical ward's 34 beds have been closed. The general secretary of the association, Brett Holmes, said nurses were furious that Hunter Health had not provided sufficient funds to employ enough nurses to run the hospital safely. A Hunter Health spokeswoman said additional nurses were being recruited.

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