3. Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) Link to this
to the Minister of Health
How many category C cancer patients have been sent to Australia for radiotherapy treatment this year, specified by cancer treatment centre?
Hon PETE HODGSON (Minister of Health) Link to this
Radiotherapy in Australia is sometimes offered to category C patients, often when the district health board experiences a surge in demand. In the financial year just finished two centres have offered treatment in Australia and four have not. A total of 211 patients in Auckland and in MidCentral have accepted this offer. Although that represents only 2 percent of all patients who receive radiotherapy in New Zealand, it does materially improve the timeliness of radiotherapy treatment for all cancer patients.
Is the Minister aware that Palmerston North cancer patients are waiting up to 3 months to begin radiation treatment, which is over three times the Ministry of Health guidelines, and why have these delays got so bad; last year he blamed the strikes, what is his excuse for failure this year?
The situation in mid-Canterbury started off quite badly, got a lot better, and has started to deteriorate just in recent weeks. The situation around the country is that nearly all patients in category C get their treatment in a timely manner, and all patients who are in categories A or B—the ones who really need it—always get it on time.
Maryan StreetWhat has been the main limiting factor for radiotherapy in New Zealand, and is the proportion of New Zealanders who are being treated in a timely way getting better or worse?
In recent years the key problem has been the shortage of radiation therapists—the people who work the machines. The National Government in its time decided to let the market deliver radiation therapists and—surprise, surprise—the market failed to deliver. This Government has now actively increased training so that there are now 36 percent more radiotherapists in the workforce and the number of graduates each year has now doubled. Because the workforce problem has been substantially addressed, the proportion of New Zealanders who receive timely therapy has steadily risen, as this graph of figures over recent years shows.
Barbara StewartIf, as reported, a facility is set up in Auckland to make the radioactive material used for PET scanners, will he request that the district health boards review the case for the purchase of PET scanners for use in the public health system; if not, why not?
That is a good question. The member is well aware, but the House may not be, that PET scanners are not actually involved in treatment; they are a diagnostic tool and a treatment refinement tool. The situation with PET scanners is that at present New Zealand is drawing up criteria—I am talking about doing that this year—for PET scan use. If we then apply those criteria across our population, we will be able to estimate the likely number of people who would benefit from PET scan use. If that use was sufficient to warrant having a PET scanner, then I am sure the district health boards would review the case for purchasing one.
Given that cancer patients in Auckland who face an 8-week delay for radiotherapy are offered treatment in Australia, why are women with cancer in the lower North Island who face 3-month delays not being offered treatment elsewhere in New Zealand or in Australia, or is the Government satisfied that what people get from the health system depends more on where they live than what they need—nothing short of health care by postcode?
I think the member managed to mishear my answer to his primary question. MidCentral—that is, Palmerston North—sends patients to Australia.
The member suggests that somehow or other I have given him the wrong figures. His question asked about the number of people who had been sent to Australia in the last year; I gave him that information. The information I have given him is correct. He has now decided he is going to make it up for himself. It is not appropriate to do that.
Has the Minister seen the reports of the MidCentral District Health Board spokesperson who, earlier this month, said that sending patients to Australia was not being considered by the district health board, and does he recall the Prime Minister’s speech to the Labour Party when she said: “Why are cancer patients waiting so long for radiotherapy that their cancer is dangerously progressing? I have a friend who waited for 3 months and still does not know for sure whether that will prove fatal.”; and what does he say to the women of Palmerston North—and of Canterbury, on the latest available information—who are waiting more than 3 months to begin this lifesaving treatment?
District health boards offer patients treatment in Australia if they feel they cannot give it to their patients in a timely way. Some patients say: “That’s a good idea. I would rather have my treatment sooner, in Australia.” Some patients say: “No, that’s OK. I’m OK with the situation that I’m in. I’ll take my treatment in New Zealand later.” That is the situation—it is an offer. It is an offer that has been around for a while. It is an offer that the National Party called for 5 years ago, saying: “Can you please let these people have treatment in Australia?”. And we do. The long and short of it is that the proportion of New Zealanders who get treatment in a timely way has been going up. If members want to know what it was like 10 years ago, I will quote from a little memo to the Minister of Health at the time, Jenny Shipley. North Health indicated that in Auckland alone there were 259 people who were waiting an average of 16½ weeks—that is an average, not one or two people waiting more than 13 weeks. There were 259 of them waiting an average of over 3—damn near 4—months.
Does the Minister stand by his recent statement that the health budget should not be used to pay rent to private landlords, and how does that square with the new breast cancer screening facility in Palmerston North being in a privately owned building that is rented by the district health board and having been opened in March last year by the Minister himself?
Large parts of our health system are privately run, and large parts of it is privately provided, including the provision of real estate. My statement that the member referred to—he pretends to misquote it—is about a situation in which for ideological reasons there is a requirement that a hospital be built by the private sector and rented out to a district health board, such that even after 10 or 12 years, when the building is paid off, the landlord is banking the money and the patients are not the getting the care they would otherwise get because the money has gone to the landlord.
Which of these is Government policy: the Minister’s statement that the health budget should not be spent on paying rent to private landlords, the reality of a breast cancer screening facility in Palmerton North that is privately owned but rented by the district health board, or the fact of the publicly funded district health board mental health and public health facilities being provided from rented buildings by a district health board in his own electorate in Dunedin?
Madam SPEAKERI stand against political pressure on any health provider to require it to go to the private market and get a deal that damages health care because ideology trumps common sense.
Hon Dr Michael CullenIndeed, Napier is a good example; so is Central Hawke’s Bay. There are plenty of examples of National, when in power, using its ideological pressure to require landlords to be enriched at the expense of the health of New Zealanders.
I seek leave to table the statement “crucial health funds could be diverted from treating patients into paying rent to private landlords.”
I seek leave to table a report from the MidCentral District Health Board spokesperson, who said: “Treatment in Australia—”.