Eileen Goodwin

The impartiality of the Australian neurosurgeon who will help decide the future configuration of neurosurgery in the South Island has been called into question by a Dunedin Hospital clinical leader.

Smoking is to be banned at psychiatric wards in Dunedin, a move labelled "forced treatment" by Southern District Health Board (SDHB) member Richard Thomson.

The Dunedin City Council is under fire for closing a historic railway pedestrian overbridge for safety reasons, and admits confusion about whether it has responsibility for its maintenance.

Public awareness of the neurosurgery battle was lower in Southland than Otago, Southern District Health Board member Richard Thomson said at yesterday's hospital advisory committee in Invercargill.

Security at Dunedin Hospital is to be tightened because of an increase in the number of patients and visitors carrying weapons.

The IT chief who rebuilt the old Otago health board's IT department after the Michael Swann fraud says he is looking forward to his new challenge in the private sector.

Involuntary redundancies at Dunedin's Ashburn Clinic have been lower than expected, with only two full-time staff forced to take redundancy among the staff laid off, says clinic business manager Lindsay Smith.

A bid to extend smokefree status to include psychiatric patients will be presented at a Southern District Health Board committee today.

A woman sustained a hand injury in a crash just south of Waikouaiti yesterday afternoon.

The doctor at the centre of the Colin Bouwer poisoning case depicted on television last week says the show portrayed well the "monster hidden in the man".