Help from private hospitals would be needed to carry out hundreds of delayed operations, and could mean GPs picking up follow-up appointments surgeons might otherwise have handled, chief executive Chris Fleming told the board yesterday.
‘‘My understanding is that there were 418 surgeries cancelled but probably more like 900 patients didn’t receive surgery who would have.
‘‘The catch-up is most certainly going to go well beyond the financial year.
‘‘I think the catch-up will take at least a year to truly get on top of.’’
Some additional in-house surgical capacity could be created but operations would have to be outsourced to private providers, Mr Fleming said.
Mercy Hospital, which last week resumed limited elective surgeries, has already said it expected to be working on helping clear the SDHB backlog for at least a year.
Specialist services executive director Patrick Ng said the final surgery delivery model was being finalised, but with proper funding and extra weekend clinics the backlog could be cleared in four to six months.
Mr Fleming said some aspects of the board’s March financial figures were encouraging, but the state of the books for April and beyond was reliant on as yet unconfirmed funding from the Ministry of Health.
‘‘There is an assumption that the ministry is going to replace the lost revenue via planned care with a separate funding stream.
‘‘The ministry have indicated that will be the case but to date the only funding associated with Covid that has come directly to DHBs has been for specific targeted things like the additional money for private care.’’
Not only surgery but first specialist appointments and follow-ups had been affected, Mr Fleming said.
‘‘One of the conversations we are having with the primary health organisation is that as part of the recovery, how much should be us partnering with primary care and doing things differently.
‘‘Outpatient appointments is something like 9000 not delivered in that period and when you add follow-ups into the mix it adds up to something like 16,000 in total, so ... are there some follow-ups that could be moved to primary care?’’ Mr Fleming said.
While the shutdown of many hospital services during Level 4 had resulted in some savings, Mr Fleming expected ‘‘dramatic’’ changes in the April numbers, due to loss of revenue and increased expenditure.
‘‘What the board needs to be worried about is that a lot of the stuff that is down will come back to haunt us in the weeks and months to come.
‘‘We need to be really transparent about the implications of the actions we have taken to truly make sure we recover fully.’’
The board also approved an unspecified capital draw down for the troubled intensive care unit project, stage two of which has been delayed by issues with the ventilation system.
