3. Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) Link to this
to the Minister of Health
How does the number of resourced level 3 neonatal intensive-care unit cots in New Zealand compare with international benchmarks, and how many of those cots are available today?
Hon STEVE CHADWICK (Associate Minister of Health) Link to this
There are around 80 level 3 neonatal cots in New Zealand. This number differs from figures published this morning, because the neonatal website was incorrect. It has now been updated to include new capacity at Middlemore Hospital. There is an annual short-term pressure that that member plays politics over at this time of the year, every year. However, I assure the member the issue is being well handled. Strategies are already in place for dealing with this, which include increasing intensive-care capacity within units, utilising additional nurses within hospitals, moving babies and mothers to other units, and—where necessary—utilising care in Australia. These are normal processes for dealing with these annual short-term pressures, and have been around since I was a midwife 30 years ago.
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. The question was quite clear in asking the Minister what was the number of those beds currently available, and she did not provide an answer.
Madam SPEAKERI thought the Minister did address the question. As members know, they cannot ask for specific answers to questions. If members wish that, please change the Standing Orders.
What is the Government’s excuse this time for the crisis in neonatal intensive-care cots when it was warned 5 years ago that this crisis would happen, and since then it has added so few beds for the most at-risk new babies in this country?
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
There is no crisis, actually, in neonatal capacity in this country. As I mentioned in my answer, this question is an annual event. This year we are experiencing yet another blip in increases in birth—
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
Well, birth rate blips happen—you know, we cannot “manage” people to conceive. I am very confident in our ability to manage the current situation. I congratulate the extra nurses who have come in to help, and I also acknowledge the tolerance of parents, whose confidence needs to be supported. Rather than turning this into a crisis, we are saying that if parents need to be moved because of their child’s care, then we will move the child and we will move the parent, as well. That is common practice.
Louisa WallKia ora, Madam Speaker; tēnā koutou katoa. What steps has the Government taken to improve neonatal provision in New Zealand’s hospitals?
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
Following a review of neonatal care in 2004—just in 2004—this Government has already expanded the provision of neonatal care. In 2006 Middlemore Hospital had its capacity doubled, from six to 12 intensive-care cots. Normal capacity in level 3 numbers will also increase to 86 when both Wellington and Hamilton neonatal units open in 2009, thanks to this Government.
Barbara StewartHas the Minister’s ministry investigated any possible link between the shortage of neonatal intensive-care cots and the increase in the number of non-resident women giving birth in New Zealand—74 every week, if the ministry’s figures are accurate—if so, what is being done to ensure that non-residents do not take advantage of our health system?
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
I am aware that work is going on around intensive-care units in the country to look at the number of non-residents who utilise cots, and when we know those figures, we will have a strategy around them.
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
I have already answered that question. It changes hourly. On the website this morning it said “0”, but that number did not have factored into it the extra four cots in Middlemore Hospital. So that website has been updated today.
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
I cannot give the member the figure as at 2.30 from this morning’s figure, because it will have changed.
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
No, the website was wrong, I say to Mr Ryall. The four extra cots were not mentioned on that website, but they are now. I do not know the figure now; babies are born quite rapidly. We have pressure on neonatal services and neonatal cots in this country.
Is the Minister, as a midwife, not most concerned that, despite all the Government’s talk, it will still be well short of the internationally acceptable standard of care for these fragile little babies?
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
I think that the member has taken on someone here who knows a bit more about neonatal services in this country than he does, but I would just say, as I have already said, I am confident that the strategies the Ministry of Health has in place are very robust. But I have asked the Ministry of Health to explore the use of a national coordinator for neonatal intensive-care provision across the country.
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
It is a good thing, actually, if the member could only just listen. This will ensure that short-term pressures experienced can be identified early and staff as managers—
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
I said that the member mentions this every year. This will allow managers in current units to get on with managing the workplace on a day-to-day basis and the district health boards will step up to national coordination. What a good thing!
Hon Mark BurtonI raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I do not know whether there is a technical problem with the speakers, but I can barely hear the Minister or even just the endless carping from the member opposite. But either way, I ask whether we could do something about the sound—or maybe Mr Ryall could just be quiet.
No, I will ask that the sound be checked. But it was very difficult to hear the Minister. There was a level of chat in the House, but it was not exceptional.
Is this not another inadequate Government response to a crisis in the health system when, in fact, there is only one cot available for a high-risk premature child born in the country today, and despite being warned 5 years ago, all the Government and the Ministry of Health are now doing is planning to hold “a meeting soon” for more talk, and apparently this afternoon we find there is going to be a new district health board - Ministry of Health manager to try to deal with the problem?
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
Not a manager, actually, a neonatal coordinator—quite different, actually. [ Interruption] No, and I just want to say that the member’s figure of one, which he keeps saying, is quite incorrect. What the member does not seem to have realised is that this figure ignores the flexibility that neonatal units have; one can move a level 2 bed up to a level 3 bed. That goes on all the time and those figures change hourly.
Katrina ShanksIs the Minister aware that the Whanganui District Health Board is being subsidised by the local district council to try to bring obstetricians to Wanganui, and is this what the people of New Zealand can expect from a Labour-led Government—that local councils are forced to subsidise basic health services?
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
I am very aware that there is very good regional provision of services for obstetrics and gynaecology under way as a joint venture between Wanganui and Palmerston North.
I seek leave to table documents showing that in Wanganui there is now no specialist obstetric service in that provincial city.
Hon STEVE CHADWICK Link to this
I seek leave to table the “New Born Unit: Hospital Cot Status”, which is available on a website.