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RNZ News
44 minutes ago
- RNZ News
What you need to know about Wednesday's nurses strike
Nurses held an 8-hour strike last December. A new strike is planned for 24 hours on Wednesday. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone Nurses are going on strike on Wednesday. About 36,000 nurses, midwives and health care assistants will be off the job from 9am Wednesday to 9am Thursday. Last-ditch negotiations on Monday failed to reach an agreement . There will be pickets and marches throughout the country. Nurses are concerned about staffing levels and safety . The latest pay offer was also dismissed as a "massive backward step" . Health NZ is offering a 3 percent pay rise over 27 months, plus two lump sum payments of $325. NZNO's counter-offer seeks a 5 percent pay rise over two years, along with $2000 flat rate increases for senior positions. The union also seeks to restore a Tikanga Māori allowance. "The average salary for both senior and registered nurses, including overtime, PDRP allowance, and penal rates, is $125,662, Health NZ said . "Members also need a wage offer that enables them to meet the rising cost of living without them and their whānau going backwards financially for the important mahi they do," said Paul Goulter, chief executive of the New Zealand Nurses Organisation. "We believe the offer we have made to the union is a fair one given our current financial constraints," Health NZ said. In a statement, Health New Zealand said "we are disappointed that the New Zealand Nurses Organisation (NZNO) is taking strike action when there is a fair offer on the table." "We are concerned about the impact strike action will have on patients who are waiting for planned care." Goulter said the latest offer from Health New Zealand ignores worries about safe staffing . "Patients are at risk because of short staffing. Nurses, midwives and health care assistants are stretched too thin and can't give patients the care they need. This is heartbreaking for our exhausted members who became health care workers because they want to help people." A safe staffing agreement was dropped from negotiations with Health New Zealand. Figures obtained by NZNO from Health New Zealand show surgical hospital wards were short-staffed more than half of all day shifts last year. Health New Zealand said in their statement it also seeks to keep nurses and patients safe. "While we are aware of NZNO's commentary in recent weeks we would like to reassure New Zealanders that Health NZ is completely committed to safe staffing. "For us safe staffing in a busy hospital environment includes the skills mix of the staff, the way care is provided, strong clinical judgement, flexibility and thoughtful decision making from our experienced leaders on the frontline. We take responsibility for operational and patient safety decisions seriously as we are accountable for the safety of patients who access our services." Paul Goulter, chief executive of the New Zealand Nurses Organisation. Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon Goulter said the key issue was making sure there was enough staff to "ensure patient safety", which was "foremost in the minds of our members" during negotiations. "While, obviously, there's a wage element, we're trying to do our best to ensure we get staffing that's appropriate to meet what patients need and we seem to have come up short on that," he told RNZ recently. Negotiations began last October, but the union said bargaining had stalled over "big ticket items" centred on public safety. Nurses also walked off the job in strike in December for eight hours. "We are striking because patient safety is at risk every day due to chronic understaffing and under-resourcing," Wellington nurse Hilary Gardner said. "We simply don't have enough nurses to provide the level of care our patients need and deserve. It's not safe, and it's not fair - for patients, their whānau, or the staff trying to care for them. We've raised concerns time and time again, but nothing changes - so now we're taking action to stand up for safer care." Acute and emergency services will still be provided, including maternity care, intensive care, ambulance services and emergency departments. Patients already in hospital will still receive ongoing care. "... The public can be reassured that we have an agreement with NZNO for life preserving services support throughout the strike and our hospitals and emergency departments will remain open," Health NZ Chief Executive Dr Dale Bramley said. "To maintain patient safety, most clinics will be closed. However, if you have a hospital appointment, please come to your appointment unless we have contacted you directly to reschedule." However, most appointments for the strike days will be rescheduled. "It is estimated that 4300 planned procedures and specialist appointments would have to be postponed should the 24-hour strike action on 30 and 31 July go ahead," Dr Bramley said. Aged residential care, St John Ambulance, GPs and hospice services are not affected by the strike and will carry on as normal. Anyone unsure about whether they need emergency department care should contact their GP or call Healthline 0800 611 116 for free advice. Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone The union does not rule out further action if their concerns aren't met, Goulter said. "Our members have indicated this strike is just the beginning and they are in it for the long haul." "Our members don't take this action lightly. They are striking because they are exasperated with being short-staffed and their patients being put at risk because Te Whatu Ora refuses to resource safe staffing levels and instead staffs to an arbitrary budget set by the government. "The public know that when there aren't enough nurses, patients wait longer to get the care they need. Critical observations and treatments may be delayed, errors are more likely and health outcomes worsen. A lack of nurses has reduced numbers of elective surgeries for years and contributed to longer waiting times and the current backlog. "Any member of the public who has been to a hospital recently knows the reality for patients and the nurses, midwives, health care assistants and kaimahi hauora who care for them." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
3 hours ago
- RNZ News
More support needed for rural Māori looking after whānau with dementia, researchers say
Dr Makarena Dudley. Photo: University of Auckland / Supplied Too many rural Māori whānau are caring for loved ones with dementia - or mate wareware - without support, diagnosis or the information they need, according to two leading brain researchers. Sir Richard Faull, director of the Centre for Brain Research at the University of Auckland, and deputy director, Māori, Dr Makarena Dudley, say Māori and Pacific people are affected by dementia more than any other group. They spoke to Nine to Noon about travelling around the country visiting marae sharing information and hearing stories. So far they've held hui at marae in the Far North and Whanganui, and more are planned. Dudley said the goal is to reach out to all Māori communities, particularly those in remote areas, to share information about the condition and gather the kōrero of caregivers. "Some of these caregivers are desperate for support, they're caring for sometimes loved ones who are exhibiting very challenging behaviours. Looking after somebody who has mate wareware particularly in the more severe stages of the condition can be extremely challenging and often even amongst Māori families that responsibility is often left to one person." Providing support for caregivers is one of the major parts of this program, Dudley said, many are isolated in rural areas and don't know where to turn to for help. "There was an international study done actually across a number of nations that caregivers often die more than the person they are tending to." Aotearoa is in the midst of conducting a nationwide prevalence study, which has another year to go, but once it's finished there will be accurate data about the extent of dementia among Māori, she said. The goal of travelling around to marae is to reach out to all Māori communities to give them information about dementia and listen to their experiences with the condition, she said. "Then we can take that information back with us and decide okay so here are the issues, here are the problems, how are we going to address this, how are we going to help to fix this and so we've visited around about 25 marae so far. .. we've spoken to hundreds of kaumātua, we've listened to their stories, some of them quite heartbreaking. "One of the main themes that's come across from all these visits is that there is a profound lack of information available to the Māori community and more so for those who are living more remotely not only is there a lack of information but there are virtually no services available to them." The Centre for Brain Research is currently funding a program to support caregivers in Ahipara, Dudley said so far its been a success and it's service that doesn't require a lot of funding. Dudley has also helped develop an app to help Māori affected by dementia. The app provides all the basic information a whānau might want to know about dementia, she said. The app provides all the basic information a whānau might want to know about dementia. Photo: supplied Faull said the ethos of the Centre for Brain Research is not only to do research but communicate that research to people and then listen to them. Faull said it's a privilege to go out to marae to listen to people and put that ethos into action. "We are actually seeing an absence of services in so many ways, this is for Māori and non-Māori, but especially for Māori so that's why it's important for us to go out and tell them about the risk factors." If you address the risk factors you can reduce the prevalence of Alzheimer's by about 60 percent, he said, so communicating that to people on the ground is vitally important. Sir Richard Faull. Photo: University of Auckland / CBR Dudley said when developing a model for treating dementia that resonates with Māori they need to use the information from both knowledge bases, western science and mātauranga. "They need to know information from both worlds." "Because there is a lot of information out there now but Māori don't really buy into it, it doesn't resonate with them because its not in their speak, it's not familiar to them the language that is used the way it is introduced to them." The Centre for Brain Research is currently working to produce a model that works for Māori, she said, once that happens she believes progress will be made in reducing incidents of dementia. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
8 hours ago
- RNZ News
Dargaville Hospital loses its only full-time doctor
Dargaville Hospital has lost its last full-time doctor. Photo: RNZ / Peter de Graaf Dargaville Hospital has lost its last full-time doctor, the latest setback in a staffing crisis affecting many rural hospitals around the country. Health New Zealand said the doctor's departure is unfortunate, but it has enough staff to keep the hospital running on the current roster, and there won't be any change to staffing levels in place since late last year. The 12-bed Northland hospital came close to shutting down last October when it could no longer find enough doctors to fill the 24-hour roster. The inpatient ward now runs without a doctor most nights. Instead, overnight care is provided by nurses backed up by a telehealth service, in which a doctor at another location offers advice via phone or video call when needed. Hopes of returning to 24-hour medical cover slipped further out of reach at the end of June with the loss of the hospital's only remaining full-time doctor. Rural medicine specialist Josh Griffiths, a member of the ASMS doctors' union, said the hospital now had two-and-a-half full-time-equivalent (FTE) doctors, when four were needed. "We were already not in a great place, staffing wise. When she was here, we were down to about two thirds of our job-sized FTEs. With her gone, that takes us down to about half." Dr Griffiths said the doctor's departure was a blow because she was committed to Dargaville - she had even bought a home in the town - and had specifically sought a position in rural Northland when she was recruited from the US about three years ago. Dr Griffiths said the remaining doctors were doing extra day shifts to fill the roster, but that was balanced by fewer night shifts now the hospital no longer had a doctor on duty 24 hours. They had, however, hoped to return to 24-hour cover at some point. "This just takes us a step further away from reinstating full services, which is really disheartening," he said. Dargaville Hospital serves about 27,000 people living in the town (pictured) and surrounding Kaipara District. Photo: Peter de Graaf/RNZ Mike Shepherd, acting deputy chief executive for Health NZ's northern region, said Kaipara residents continued to receive the same level of service from Dargaville Hospital as they had since November. "We have received the resignation of one of our doctors and clearly that's unfortunate, but we continue to have enough doctors to staff the roster without impacting the service for patients," he said. "We're continuing to actively recruit to further staff, as you'd expect, and we don't anticipate any change to service to the community." Shepherd said Health NZ had yet to decide whether to try to reinstate 24-hour cover. "We're having that conversation... Our priority at the moment is to continue to provide what we are providing. We think we're providing a good service during the day, and a safe service overnight using the range of treatment and staff that we have." Shepherd said the number of calls nurses were making to Emergency Consult, the hospital's telehealth provider, had decreased as they became more skilled at managing issues in the ward overnight. Meanwhile, Dr Griffiths said he had mixed views on telehealth. He believed it was safe and essential, because it was filling a gap that could have otherwise forced the hospital to close. "But it doesn't always work out great for patients. We now transfer anyone unstable to Whangārei but that means a massive increase in the use of ambulance transfers, which is a problem for St John who are also struggling with staffing in rural areas. It's also problematic for patients who want to be cared for close to home." Dr Griffiths said it also put extra strain on Whangārei Hospital, because patients that could have been treated in Dargaville were now sent there. Another problem was that patients who were not particularly ill could not be sent home because they could not be fully assessed overnight. "So they're either transferred to Whangārei or kept in Dargaville overnight where they can be monitored, and the next day the doctor has an increase in workload because stuff's been deferred from overnight... So, it's safe, but it's clearly sub-optimal, and a lot of patients tell me that they're dissatisfied because they can't really be dealt with by telehealth, they're just deferred or transferred." Dr Griffiths said he was "really proud" of the way Dargaville's nurses had stepped up. "It's resulted in a lot of upskilling, and nurse management has taken a proactive stance by trying to get people through courses to educate them more on managing emergencies in a way they wouldn't have had to previously, because the doctor would have taken the lead," he said. "Some of them have taken to it really well. Others are not really happy because it's different to what they signed up for. I'm also worried about our senior nurses, because they're compensating for the lack of doctor cover by being on call for critical issues 24/7, and sharing that amongst themselves." Dr Griffiths acknowledged that recruiting doctors was difficult worldwide, not just in Dargaville. "But I do think there are specific things that could be done better, which we've pushed for, and we've had a really lacklustre response." In particular, he said Health NZ should increase the rural recruitment and retention bonus paid to doctors who took up jobs in hard-to-staff places like Dargaville. As for the improved after-hours medical service promised in May by Health Minister Simeon Brown, Dr Griffiths said it was a positive move, but he was surprised no one at the hospital had heard about it before the announcement. He hoped officials would talk to locals and find out what was needed, rather than impose a top-down solution. Brown told RNZ the $164 million programme to expand and strengthen after-hours healthcare across the country would be rolled out during 2026 and 2027. He said Health NZ was currently considering the model and specific timing for the service. Within Northland, better after-hours access would be provided in Dargaville, Hokianga, Kaikohe, Kaitaia, Kawakawa, Mangawhai and Waipapa. Health NZ was also working on improved access to daytime urgent care in Dargaville, he said. Brown said he also expected Health NZ to continue recruiting clinical staff for Dargaville Hospital. "I have received assurances that Health NZ are doing so, and that existing services for patients will be maintained while this is underway," he said. Dargaville Hospital serves a population of about 27,000 people. The nearest secondary-level hospital is at Whangārei, about an hour's drive away on State Highway 14. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
