❓ The Minister for Health defends the decision to use private hospitals to reduce surgery waitlists, highlighting alignment with the Commonwealth's approach and criticising the state opposition's stance. The initiative aims to address long wait times by allowing patients to access care in public or private facilities, with funding following the patient.
AnsweredQoN 60Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
WAITLIST SURGERY PATIENTS — PRIVATE HOSPITAL TREATMENT
I note that the opposition has criticised the minister’s decision to ensure that people waiting for surgery would receive their operations as soon as possible, even if that means being treated in private hospitals. Is this view of the state opposition supported by the Labor Prime Minister and the federal government? Dr K.D. HAMES
I note that the opposition has criticised the minister’s decision to ensure that people waiting for surgery would receive their operations as soon as possible, even if that means being treated in private hospitals. Is this view of the state opposition supported by the Labor Prime Minister and the federal government? Dr K.D. HAMES
AnswerView source ↗
It is funny that the member should ask me that! When the latest waitlist figures came out, I was not happy because the number of those waiting outside the boundary had gone up. Therefore, I decided that we would do something fairly drastic to make a change. Having said that, the performance of the hospital service regarding waitlist surgery has been exceptionally good. The hospitals have performed an extra 2 500 operations in the past year than were performed the year before. They are well above the federal target. As they were well in front of the commonwealth target, which has been set with both commonwealth dollars and a significant increase in funding from the state—a provision of $30 million of state money as part of our election commitment to decrease waiting lists—the hospitals took their foot off the pedal over Christmas, and I was not very happy with them. We decided that the patients who are over boundary deserved special treatment. Those patients tend to be kept on the waitlist of the hospital to which they were originally attached, as does the money for the extra waitlist surgery. An urgent patient goes over boundary after 30 days, a semi-urgent patient after 90 days, and a non-urgent patient after 365 days. The money of a person who has waited for over a year for non-urgent hip surgery will now attach to the patient rather than to the hospital, and the patient can go to another hospital to have the surgery performed. The first place the patient can go is to another public hospital, including a public–private hospital. Peel Health Campus and Joondalup Health Campus have the capacity to do additional waitlist surgery. A patient at Fremantle Hospital who has waited for longer than a year for non-urgent surgery can go to either of those places to get the surgery done when the hospital has the capacity to do it and a surgeon wants to do it. In some cases, the capacity is not there, particularly for plastic surgery. Recently, a semi-urgent patient—a man with basal cell cancer on his nose—waited longer than the appropriate time. We will send those types of patients to a private hospital if the private hospital has the capacity. The same applies to the long-term waitlist surgical procedures. We released this policy last Thursday. I happened to be watching television that night and saw Mr Rudd on the 7.30 Report announcing what the commonwealth would do to reform the hospital process. The Prime Minister highlighted exactly the same thing that I had just announced. He said that he would allow patients to go to the private sector if they were waiting outside boundary. I am used to the opposition spokesperson on health; I know what he is like. If I say that something is black, he will say it is white. He will go against whatever I say and he will always take the negative side of whatever the media tells him. The media do not want to talk to him very much anymore because they know that he gilds the lily so much. I thought that he would be with me on this because his boss in the commonwealth has said that he agrees with me. However, what did I read in the Deputy Leader of the Opposition’s press release? I read that the opposition has condemned the move to send patients to private hospitals. As the day went on, the story became less severe. I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the Opposition got a call from Kevin to say that perhaps the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had gone a bit overboard because the Prime Minister had just announced the same thing yesterday. An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
Dr K.D. HAMES replied: It is funny that the member should ask me that! When the latest waitlist figures came out, I was not happy because the number of those waiting outside the boundary had gone up. Therefore, I decided that we would do something fairly drastic to make a change. Having said that, the performance of the hospital service regarding waitlist surgery has been exceptionally good. The hospitals have performed an extra 2 500 operations in the past year than were performed the year before. They are well above the federal target. As they were well in front of the commonwealth target, which has been set with both commonwealth dollars and a significant increase in funding from the state—a provision of $30 million of state money as part of our election commitment to decrease waiting lists—the hospitals took their foot off the pedal over Christmas, and I was not very happy with them. We decided that the patients who are over boundary deserved special treatment. Those patients tend to be kept on the waitlist of the hospital to which they were originally attached, as does the money for the extra waitlist surgery. An urgent patient goes over boundary after 30 days, a semi-urgent patient after 90 days, and a non-urgent patient after 365 days. The money of a person who has waited for over a year for non-urgent hip surgery will now attach to the patient rather than to the hospital, and the patient can go to another hospital to have the surgery performed. The first place the patient can go is to another public hospital, including a public–private hospital. Peel Health Campus and Joondalup Health Campus have the capacity to do additional waitlist surgery. A patient at Fremantle Hospital who has waited for longer than a year for non-urgent surgery can go to either of those places to get the surgery done when the hospital has the capacity to do it and a surgeon wants to do it. In some cases, the capacity is not there, particularly for plastic surgery. Recently, a semi-urgent patient—a man with basal cell cancer on his nose—waited longer than the appropriate time. We will send those types of patients to a private hospital if the private hospital has the capacity. The same applies to the long-term waitlist surgical procedures. We released this policy last Thursday. I happened to be watching television that night and saw Mr Rudd on the 7.30 Report announcing what the commonwealth would do to reform the hospital process. The Prime Minister highlighted exactly the same thing that I had just announced. He said that he would allow patients to go to the private sector if they were waiting outside boundary. I am used to the opposition spokesperson on health; I know what he is like. If I say that something is black, he will say it is white. He will go against whatever I say and he will always take the negative side of whatever the media tells him. The media do not want to talk to him very much anymore because they know that he gilds the lily so much. I thought that he would be with me on this because his boss in the commonwealth has said that he agrees with me. However, what did I read in the Deputy Leader of the Opposition’s press release? I read that the opposition has condemned the move to send patients to private hospitals. As the day went on, the story became less severe. I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the Opposition got a call from Kevin to say that perhaps the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had gone a bit overboard because the Prime Minister had just announced the same thing yesterday. An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
It is funny that the member should ask me that! When the latest waitlist figures came out, I was not happy because the number of those waiting outside the boundary had gone up. Therefore, I decided that we would do something fairly drastic to make a change. Having said that, the performance of the hospital service regarding waitlist surgery has been exceptionally good. The hospitals have performed an extra 2 500 operations in the past year than were performed the year before. They are well above the federal target. As they were well in front of the commonwealth target, which has been set with both commonwealth dollars and a significant increase in funding from the state—a provision of $30 million of state money as part of our election commitment to decrease waiting lists—the hospitals took their foot off the pedal over Christmas, and I was not very happy with them. We decided that the patients who are over boundary deserved special treatment. Those patients tend to be kept on the waitlist of the hospital to which they were originally attached, as does the money for the extra waitlist surgery. An urgent patient goes over boundary after 30 days, a semi-urgent patient after 90 days, and a non-urgent patient after 365 days. The money of a person who has waited for over a year for non-urgent hip surgery will now attach to the patient rather than to the hospital, and the patient can go to another hospital to have the surgery performed. The first place the patient can go is to another public hospital, including a public–private hospital. Peel Health Campus and Joondalup Health Campus have the capacity to do additional waitlist surgery. A patient at Fremantle Hospital who has waited for longer than a year for non-urgent surgery can go to either of those places to get the surgery done when the hospital has the capacity to do it and a surgeon wants to do it. In some cases, the capacity is not there, particularly for plastic surgery. Recently, a semi-urgent patient—a man with basal cell cancer on his nose—waited longer than the appropriate time. We will send those types of patients to a private hospital if the private hospital has the capacity. The same applies to the long-term waitlist surgical procedures. We released this policy last Thursday. I happened to be watching television that night and saw Mr Rudd on the 7.30 Report announcing what the commonwealth would do to reform the hospital process. The Prime Minister highlighted exactly the same thing that I had just announced. He said that he would allow patients to go to the private sector if they were waiting outside boundary. I am used to the opposition spokesperson on health; I know what he is like. If I say that something is black, he will say it is white. He will go against whatever I say and he will always take the negative side of whatever the media tells him. The media do not want to talk to him very much anymore because they know that he gilds the lily so much. I thought that he would be with me on this because his boss in the commonwealth has said that he agrees with me. However, what did I read in the Deputy Leader of the Opposition’s press release? I read that the opposition has condemned the move to send patients to private hospitals. As the day went on, the story became less severe. I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the Opposition got a call from Kevin to say that perhaps the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had gone a bit overboard because the Prime Minister had just announced the same thing yesterday. An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
We released this policy last Thursday. I happened to be watching television that night and saw Mr Rudd on the 7.30 Report announcing what the commonwealth would do to reform the hospital process. The Prime Minister highlighted exactly the same thing that I had just announced. He said that he would allow patients to go to the private sector if they were waiting outside boundary. I am used to the opposition spokesperson on health; I know what he is like. If I say that something is black, he will say it is white. He will go against whatever I say and he will always take the negative side of whatever the media tells him. The media do not want to talk to him very much anymore because they know that he gilds the lily so much. I thought that he would be with me on this because his boss in the commonwealth has said that he agrees with me. However, what did I read in the Deputy Leader of the Opposition’s press release? I read that the opposition has condemned the move to send patients to private hospitals. As the day went on, the story became less severe. I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the Opposition got a call from Kevin to say that perhaps the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had gone a bit overboard because the Prime Minister had just announced the same thing yesterday. An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
Dr K.D. HAMES replied: It is funny that the member should ask me that! When the latest waitlist figures came out, I was not happy because the number of those waiting outside the boundary had gone up. Therefore, I decided that we would do something fairly drastic to make a change. Having said that, the performance of the hospital service regarding waitlist surgery has been exceptionally good. The hospitals have performed an extra 2 500 operations in the past year than were performed the year before. They are well above the federal target. As they were well in front of the commonwealth target, which has been set with both commonwealth dollars and a significant increase in funding from the state—a provision of $30 million of state money as part of our election commitment to decrease waiting lists—the hospitals took their foot off the pedal over Christmas, and I was not very happy with them. We decided that the patients who are over boundary deserved special treatment. Those patients tend to be kept on the waitlist of the hospital to which they were originally attached, as does the money for the extra waitlist surgery. An urgent patient goes over boundary after 30 days, a semi-urgent patient after 90 days, and a non-urgent patient after 365 days. The money of a person who has waited for over a year for non-urgent hip surgery will now attach to the patient rather than to the hospital, and the patient can go to another hospital to have the surgery performed. The first place the patient can go is to another public hospital, including a public–private hospital. Peel Health Campus and Joondalup Health Campus have the capacity to do additional waitlist surgery. A patient at Fremantle Hospital who has waited for longer than a year for non-urgent surgery can go to either of those places to get the surgery done when the hospital has the capacity to do it and a surgeon wants to do it. In some cases, the capacity is not there, particularly for plastic surgery. Recently, a semi-urgent patient—a man with basal cell cancer on his nose—waited longer than the appropriate time. We will send those types of patients to a private hospital if the private hospital has the capacity. The same applies to the long-term waitlist surgical procedures. We released this policy last Thursday. I happened to be watching television that night and saw Mr Rudd on the 7.30 Report announcing what the commonwealth would do to reform the hospital process. The Prime Minister highlighted exactly the same thing that I had just announced. He said that he would allow patients to go to the private sector if they were waiting outside boundary. I am used to the opposition spokesperson on health; I know what he is like. If I say that something is black, he will say it is white. He will go against whatever I say and he will always take the negative side of whatever the media tells him. The media do not want to talk to him very much anymore because they know that he gilds the lily so much. I thought that he would be with me on this because his boss in the commonwealth has said that he agrees with me. However, what did I read in the Deputy Leader of the Opposition’s press release? I read that the opposition has condemned the move to send patients to private hospitals. As the day went on, the story became less severe. I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the Opposition got a call from Kevin to say that perhaps the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had gone a bit overboard because the Prime Minister had just announced the same thing yesterday. An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
It is funny that the member should ask me that! When the latest waitlist figures came out, I was not happy because the number of those waiting outside the boundary had gone up. Therefore, I decided that we would do something fairly drastic to make a change. Having said that, the performance of the hospital service regarding waitlist surgery has been exceptionally good. The hospitals have performed an extra 2 500 operations in the past year than were performed the year before. They are well above the federal target. As they were well in front of the commonwealth target, which has been set with both commonwealth dollars and a significant increase in funding from the state—a provision of $30 million of state money as part of our election commitment to decrease waiting lists—the hospitals took their foot off the pedal over Christmas, and I was not very happy with them. We decided that the patients who are over boundary deserved special treatment. Those patients tend to be kept on the waitlist of the hospital to which they were originally attached, as does the money for the extra waitlist surgery. An urgent patient goes over boundary after 30 days, a semi-urgent patient after 90 days, and a non-urgent patient after 365 days. The money of a person who has waited for over a year for non-urgent hip surgery will now attach to the patient rather than to the hospital, and the patient can go to another hospital to have the surgery performed. The first place the patient can go is to another public hospital, including a public–private hospital. Peel Health Campus and Joondalup Health Campus have the capacity to do additional waitlist surgery. A patient at Fremantle Hospital who has waited for longer than a year for non-urgent surgery can go to either of those places to get the surgery done when the hospital has the capacity to do it and a surgeon wants to do it. In some cases, the capacity is not there, particularly for plastic surgery. Recently, a semi-urgent patient—a man with basal cell cancer on his nose—waited longer than the appropriate time. We will send those types of patients to a private hospital if the private hospital has the capacity. The same applies to the long-term waitlist surgical procedures. We released this policy last Thursday. I happened to be watching television that night and saw Mr Rudd on the 7.30 Report announcing what the commonwealth would do to reform the hospital process. The Prime Minister highlighted exactly the same thing that I had just announced. He said that he would allow patients to go to the private sector if they were waiting outside boundary. I am used to the opposition spokesperson on health; I know what he is like. If I say that something is black, he will say it is white. He will go against whatever I say and he will always take the negative side of whatever the media tells him. The media do not want to talk to him very much anymore because they know that he gilds the lily so much. I thought that he would be with me on this because his boss in the commonwealth has said that he agrees with me. However, what did I read in the Deputy Leader of the Opposition’s press release? I read that the opposition has condemned the move to send patients to private hospitals. As the day went on, the story became less severe. I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the Opposition got a call from Kevin to say that perhaps the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had gone a bit overboard because the Prime Minister had just announced the same thing yesterday. An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
We released this policy last Thursday. I happened to be watching television that night and saw Mr Rudd on the 7.30 Report announcing what the commonwealth would do to reform the hospital process. The Prime Minister highlighted exactly the same thing that I had just announced. He said that he would allow patients to go to the private sector if they were waiting outside boundary. I am used to the opposition spokesperson on health; I know what he is like. If I say that something is black, he will say it is white. He will go against whatever I say and he will always take the negative side of whatever the media tells him. The media do not want to talk to him very much anymore because they know that he gilds the lily so much. I thought that he would be with me on this because his boss in the commonwealth has said that he agrees with me. However, what did I read in the Deputy Leader of the Opposition’s press release? I read that the opposition has condemned the move to send patients to private hospitals. As the day went on, the story became less severe. I wonder whether the Deputy Leader of the Opposition got a call from Kevin to say that perhaps the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had gone a bit overboard because the Prime Minister had just announced the same thing yesterday. An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
An issue that has been legitimately raised by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition and the Australian Medical Association is whether this initiative will have an effect on private insurance. I do not think that it will because a patient in a private hospital who has private insurance would have picked his own doctor and hospital and the time in which he had surgery. Normally, the operation would occur two or three months after the condition if it was a non-urgent condition. The public hospital patient who needed the same non-urgent operation and who was in the next bed, which was paid for by us, would have been waiting at a public hospital in the public system for a year before he was given the option of being given a bed in the private hospital. The private hospital patient would say, “Thank God I wasn’t in the public system because I got my op straightaway”, and the public hospital patient would say, “I wish I had private insurance because I would have got the operation done when he got his done and I wouldn’t have had to put up with it for seven or eight months longer than I needed to.”
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