Service must be retained

The cold answer is that if we don't 5 to 10 lives will be lost each year; or worse, they will become cases of severe brain damage which will cost millions in lifelong support.

From the time a life-threatening bleed occurs inside the skull and reaches the pressure which will drop blood supply to the brain below a critical pressure we have 2 hours, at most, to relieve that pressure.

After that time there is a steady permanent loss of brain function until by 4 hours the situation is irretrievable.

I spent nearly 20 years helping build a system to get injured people to Dunedin within that timeframe. Until the "Beam me up Scotty" system arrives you cannot get people from the Dunedin Emergency Department to an operating theatre in Christchurch less than 3 hours in optimal conditions.

It is a deliberate sacrifice of those often young lives, or the creation of a very expensive tragic existence for them, to remove neurosurgery from Dunedin.

We care. and we care deeply. It's just that for so long we've been getting trodden on and trampled on, and the people of Dunedin are tired.

Tired of fighting to get what we want and need in the region, tired of bully boys and silly government types trying to dissolve the health care system, tired of a hospital board that has no gumption and tired of a hospital board that couldn't even manage its own house.

What is it, Roz, that we must do, because mostly what we say falls on deaf ears? Outline the plan for us

Kris Nicolau

Careys Bay

If Dunedin didn't have neurosurgeons when I needed them I would be dead.

I had a 90 minute road trip, and the advanced care paramedics working on me for half of it. I had lost a lot of spinal fluid so there was no way they could fly me because of the drop in pressure in the spine and head.

If I had to go to Christchurch I would be dead. It would be criminal to lose the clinic here.

Thank you,

Ken McIntosh

Although it was fifty years ago, I too spend time (three months, give or take a day or two), in the neurosurgical ward of Dunedin Hospital (in those days Ward 4). My experiences at that time brought home to me how imperative it is that neurosurgical services are retained and active in Dunedin.

I think that only 'medical politics' and, I suspect, a long-held ambition on Christchurch's part to have large chunks of the Otago Medical School's functions relocated to Canterbury, would indicate otherwise.

But then, for those with longer memories, we've been here before, with then MP George Gair's intransigence in firstly not approving a CAT-scanner for Dunedin Hospital quite a number of years ago, and then, after we had raised the money for one by public subscription, threatening us that the Government would not approve it's use or front up with finance to offset running-costs.

Believe you me, you wouldn't have wanted to sample the alternative investigative procedures, as they were 50 years ago.
Tony Ryall has all the appearances of another one out of the same mould.

As an ex-Dunedinite, I find this hard to comprehend. How can the people of Dunedin and Otago not stand up and take action to stop this?

A great drama and fuss was shouted about the controversial new stadium so that the whole of New Zealand knew. Surely the importance of doing everything possible to keep neurosurgery services at Dunedin Hospital far outweighs any stadium.

Aside from the people of the South that rely on this service, what about the Medical School?
Families should not have to endure the extra stress, worry and financial pressure when a loved one is sick, by having to deal with the addition of an unfamliar city.

Moving this facility would be as ridiculous as if it was proposed to close Queen Mary. Can any woman imagine being told that "Sorry, you can't have your baby in Dunedin, you'll have to go to Christchurch for that..."

I urge every person who has ever lived in Dunedin to show their support to keep neurosurgery in Dunedin.

Before my retirement in 2008 I had been associated with both the University of Otago and the various Dunedin/Otago heath authorities for almost 35 years.

Throughout most of this period there were repeated Machiavellian attempts by Canterbury to whittle away at the Otago Medical School clinical services with the clear underlying intention of eventually having the medical school base shifted to Christchurch.

The impact of such an outcome on the University of Otago, the southern regional health services and the wider Dunedin community would, of course, be nothing short of catastrophic.

Examples of this empire building mentality are often unseen or, if recognised, they are usually manifest only in minor forays which by themselves attract little attention.

The overall imperialist intent of Canterbury is further shrouded by the unwillingness of the most senior people in the two universities to engage in open warfare.

From time to time, like now, we see the raw power-grabbing more fully exposed. For this to happen with apparent support from the Government there must be some behind-the-scenes mutual advantage, which has absolutely nothing to do with the public good.

There is game being played out by the National government and the Canterbury DHB (supported by the active connivance of the University of Canterbury) to rob Otago and Southland of its jewels.
They must be stopped.

In 2002 I had urgent surgery and follow up with neurosurgery in Dunedin. At the time, my 3 week old baby had a life threatening condition which required surgery too.

Our family would not have been able to juggle these two situations in different parts of the country.

My husband and my other child were struggling as it was, but for all of us to have endured travelling great distance would not only have been physically risky, but extremely stressful and without the support of family and friends.

I cannot stress enough how important it is for Dunedin to retain its neurosurgery services.
For many it will literally be a case of life and death. For us it would have impacted heavily on our quality of life.