It is not right Dunedin people may be getting treatment ahead of sicker people in Southland when there is one district health board serving the whole region, Richard Thomson says.
He told the Southern District Health Board's hospitals' advisory committee in Dunedin yesterday the primary responsibility of clinicians, the board and management was to provide "equality of prioritisation" to the people of the whole area, rather than "historical ways of doing things".
The situation involved "real people with real suffering", the board member said.
He said he was getting "a bit frustrated".
"Do you think we're not?" Southland's chief medical officer David Tulloch replied.
Mr Thomson's comments came during discussion of reports on Southland Hospital which showed 529 patients had been waiting more than six months for their first specialist appointments.
Among the areas of concern were ear, nose and throat, orthopaedics, ophthalmology and gynaecology.
Mr Thomson said if the board covered one region, people should be moved across notional boundaries so the "next most important person" on the list received the treatment.
Mr Tulloch said Mr Thomson was "entirely right", but there had been difficulty in some services getting people to realise that all needed to be involved with it.
He indicated progress was being made, but it was "very hard work and time consuming".
Mr Thomson said he did not want to upset people and he had nothing but gratitude for those working on the issues, but those who were finding it difficult needed to get on board.
They needed to ask "Who are we here for? That should be the driver."
After Mr Thomson's initial comments, Otago chief operating officer Vivian Blake said she would like to "wade in" because she could "see the headlines".
Speaking about the ear, nose and throat issue, she said there had been considerable work towards how one service could be provided for the whole of the region, and progress was being made.
Acting Southland chief operating officer Leanne Samuel agreed, but said it involved a significant piece of change management which was "very complex and challenging".
Mr Tulloch said it was an ongoing battle for himself and his Otago counterpart Richard Bunton to get clinicians to grasp what changes might be needed to have services working across the whole area.
