"CARING" PUBLIC HOSPITALS

Three stories from the one day in one Australian State:

Kicked out (1)

A distressed woman was found close to collapse on a highway after hospital staff who treated her for a suspected heart attack refused to help her get home. The woman, 52, tried to walk the 20km from Atherton Hospital to her home near Yungaburra after explaining to staff she had no money and no one to pick her up. A Good Samaritan picked her up as she stumbled along the highway in her slippers and nightclothes in 30C heat. "They just don't seem to care any more," said the woman, who did not want to be identified. "The philosophy seems to be to get people in and get them out as quickly as they can."

An ambulance took the woman to Atherton Hospital after she woke with severe chest pains at 1am on Saturday, November 4. Doctors ruled out a heart attack, but could not identify the cause of her illness. She was told to go home later in the day.

"I went to the emergency counter and asked if they could help me get home," the woman said. "I didn't have any money on me for a taxi, my brother and daughter were overseas and my son was in Iraq. "I asked if an ambulance could take me, but she told me, 'No, the ambulance service is not a taxi service, madam'. I said I would just have to walk home. She shrugged her shoulders and turned her back."

The woman had walked for more than an hour when passing motorist Gail Fleming saw her in distress and offered her a lift. Ms Fleming, 58, from Atherton, said the woman was clutching her chest when she saw her walking up a hill about 4pm. "It was very hot and she was in a lot of stress," Ms Fleming said. "She just started crying straight away."

One Nation MP Rosa Lee Long raised the case in State Parliament last week to try to get more resources for hospitals in her Tablelands electorate. "She would never have made it home," Ms Long said. "These kinds of events cry out for an urgent roll-out of the promised extra funding, not in four or five years or even longer, but immediately."

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Kicked out (2)

Grandmother Gaynor Ralph was kicked out of Brisbane's Princess Alexandra Hospital with no shoes, no money and nowhere to go. Mrs Ralph, 75, was put in a taxi in only a hospital gown and her nightie despite telling staff she didn't know her son's new address. She had to be taken to a police station until officers could contact her son Charles. "I was appalled," he said yesterday. "She was told she had to go, even though they knew she had nowhere to go to." Mr Ralph was so stunned by his mother's treatment that he took pictures of her in the hospital gown after picking her up from the police station.

His mother had been in Europe when a medical emergency forced her to return to Australia for immediate treatment. She was flown to Brisbane because that's where her son lives. Mrs Ralph spent 60 hours in transit before being taken to the PA Hospital in a wheelchair with suspected deep vein thrombosis on Saturday, November 4. She was kept in hospital overnight, but a doctor examined her the next morning and told her to go home. Hospital staff gave her a taxi voucher and sent her packing.

"I had moved house and she didn't know where I'd moved to," Mr Ralph said. "Her mobile phone (battery) was flat and she didn't have any money because the hospital told us not to leave her with any valuables for security reasons."

Hospital staff said they were unable to reach Mr Ralph on his mobile phone, but police had no such problem. "I left late the night she was admitted, telling them I'd be back in the morning," Mr Ralph said. "As I arrived at the hospital I got a call from the police station to say that she was there. "I arrived at the station to find her in an ill-fitting hospital gown with no footwear."

His mother was in need of further treatment and should have been allowed to stay in hospital at least until he arrived, Mr Ralph said. "They knew I was coming and they still kicked her out," he said. "They will claim she agreed and she was willing to go. But they told her she had to go. "All she did as a frail old lady was comply to their demands." Mrs Ralph recovered at her son's home until she was well enough to return to her home in Tasmania.

State Opposition Health spokesman John-Paul Langbroek, who has been seeking answers for the Ralph family, said lives were being put at risk because under-funded hospitals were evicting patients too early. "It all comes back to 'bedlock'. Doctors are feeling pressure from above to clear the beds," he said.

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Wrong kneejoint fitted -- deliberately

An Ipswich grandmother who waited five years for a knee replacement has been told she needs the operation again -- because surgeons fitted the wrong joint. Marilyn Hohnke, 62, has been suffering pain in her left knee since 1999, when she was first put on the waiting list for surgery at the Royal Brisbane Hospital. She expected the operation in December 2004 would fix her problem, but was disappointed to find it made no difference. Now an examination has revealed her knee joint will never work properly because it is too big for her.

Mrs Hohnke is furious to be back on the waiting list for a second time, and says she feels let down by the health system. "It was terrible having to wait five years for this operation in the first place, but finding out that it was a complete waste of time is just so discouraging," she said. "I don't know how the doctors could have made such a mistake. "I was shocked when they told me that it was the only joint available on the day of the operation so they had to use it. "I am now at the back of the queue again and don't know how long it will be before I get it fixed. "In the meantime, I can't walk properly because it causes me great discomfort."

She has now opted to have the second knee operation at Ipswich Hospital and has been on the waiting list since May. Bosses at the Royal Brisbane Hospital said Mrs Hohnke was considered too young for the knee replacement in 1999, even though it was causing her pain. They said the operation had been a success...

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For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL hospitals and health insurance schemes should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the very poor and minimal regulation. Both Australia and Sweden have large private sector health systems with government reimbursement for privately-provided services so can a purely private system with some level of government reimbursement or insurance for the poor be so hard to do?

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