Dunedin Hospital will be running an additional acute surgery list by the end of next month if all goes to plan, Southern District Health Board chief operating officer (Otago) Vivian Blake says.
Mrs Blake said by the end of March, 36 hours of additional acute surgery should be under way, provided the hospital had no unexpected staff resignations.
At the moment, the hospital is running an additional four hours of acute surgery.
The 36-hour increase would be better for patients as it meant quicker surgery times, and less risk of elective surgeries needing to be bumped for acute work.
Agreed by the board last July, the additional acute surgery had taken longer than expected to organise because of time taken recruiting staff, Mrs Blake said.
Theatres would run night sessions on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, to cope with the additional work.
Mrs Blake said demand for acute surgery had risen significantly through the years, and the hospital had been slow to catch up with it.
"It's something that we should have done a long time ago . . . we're pulling out all stops to make it happen."
She said managers were re-checking the cost of the project.
Last July, the cost was estimated at just over $419,000; the cost of the extra wages was $864,345, but the board should save $445,330 on outsourced elective surgery.
