The National Health Board
panel says it will unveil its recommendations on future
health care in the Wakatipu in a public meeting on Monday,
August 29.
Panel chairman Dr Peter Foley, of Napier, yesterday told the
Otago Daily Times he would give a community
presentation on the report of the Wakatipu health services
expert panel, before it was formally lodged with the Southern
District Health Board the following Friday.
The "substantive" report is more than 80 pages long and
contains "major recommendations in every area" and more than
20 different "sub-recommendations".
The chairman said he felt it gave a plan, to be implemented
over time, for a sustainable health service that would have
the support of the community.
Dr Foley and panellists, consumer advocate David Russell and
emergency physician Dr Angela Pitchford, with their support
team, intended to meet five or six key health groups earlier
on August 29, to give them a "heads-up" about the report, he
said.
The report would not cure all ills in the Wakatipu health
service, "but it will provide some certainty of what is
expected by the NHB, and therefore the Government and by the
Southern DHB, as to what will and won't happen".
"You will know for certain in terms of hospital services, in
terms of a plan for the future, in terms of how the Wakatipu
will work in the region covered by the Southern DHB."
He could not say yesterday if recommendations supported any
particular models over others.
Asked if the DHB was obliged, or bound, to follow the report,
or if it could be shelved, Dr Foley said: "That's a little
bit of a grey area. They're not obliged to, per se, but as
I've said publicly, we've worked with [the DHB] as well.
"The report is to them, but it should be done in a way that
they would find it very difficult not to implement all the
proposals over the right period of time.
"I'm sure you gain the impression that the NHB might be keen
to assist them to achieve those outcomes."
Wakatipu residents would be able to give feedback to the DHB
on the report, but it would not be altered once it was made
public.
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