When staff spend thousands of dollars extra on clinical supplies, they need to ask if it is the most important use of that money, Richard Thomson told the Southern District Health Board's hospitals' advisory committee last week.
The financial report to the board showed disposable items used for treatment for the year were over budget by $270,000 for May and by $1.9 million for the year to date.
The board had budgeted to spend $24 million in this area.
The May result was due to 7% more surgery than expected being done for the month.
Mr Thomson, a board member, referred to figures above budget of $217,000 for protective clothing this year, and $157,000 for disposable drapes - some of which would be offset by the requirement for less laundering.
Later Otago Daily Times inquiries showed for 11 months the spending on disposable drapes in Dunedin Hospital was $97,000 over the $317,000 budget, with only an estimated $40,000 offset by lower laundry costs.
Mr Thomson said while he was not saying such spending was wrong, he needed to be sure the reasons for such extra spending were not for marginal benefit.
Could that money have been used to help reduce waiting time for diagnostic procedures, which were "jamming up things all over the place?" he asked.
Dr Branko Sijnja said as standards changed there had been an overall move to single-use equipment.
Dr Malcolm Macpherson said health and safety could not be traded off, but Mr Thomson said the board did that all the time when applying limited resources.
Dunedin Hospital chief operating officer Vivian Blake said there had been a report to the clinical board on this and she believed there had been a robust discussion on it.
Other overspends occurred in blood products, over budget by $676,000 for the year to the end of May, and sutures and staples, over by $291,000.
