The board's mental health and community services reported to the hospital advisory committee this week that the issues of increasing demand and waiting time for long-term hospital beds in the community continued.
The planning and funding team was working with the hospital and residential providers to address the shortage, the report said.
Mr Thomson said he needed to know more than that.
He understood the problem and was not sure there was a solution in the short term.
If the shortage could not be remedied then the board needed to know that so it could plan accordingly.
Concern has been expressed recently that the ongoing shortage of community hospital beds for the elderly means that some people have long stays in Dunedin Hospital, where aged-care services are already under pressure.
There has also been concern that the board has been putting pressure on rest-homes to take patients from the hospital.
Private hospitals say they have no incentive to expand their facilities as capital costs, up to $150,000 a bed, are not recoverable from government fees.
