DHB Chair says LabTests lied
This is a stunning revelation. The Herald reports:
Counties Manukau DHB chairman Professor Gregor Coster apologised to the meeting over what he said was Labtests’ continuing underperformance although he added that the service had improved.
“They led us to believe they had a quality and safety system in place from the outset.
“It proved not to be the case. Frankly they lied to us.”
That is very strong language. In fact you wonder how there can be a successful partnership when the DHB thinks it has been lied to.
Labtests, which was not invited to the meeting, said later: “Labtests steadfastly refutes Mr Coster’s allegations. At all times the DHBs had full and detailed oversight of Labtests’ operations.”
That doesn’t rule out that claims may have been made which were not true.
Doctors recounted problems including near-misses for their patients, alleged misdiagnosis, slow turn-around times for results, unusual results, a flood of unwanted faxes, difficulty getting to speak to a pathologist, and a pathologist not seeming to understand his role of advising a GP.
Reflecting the mood of the meeting, Dr Tony Hay, of the Mt Eden Medical Centre, called for the health boards to go further than the 10 per cent of the contract they had returned to the previous provider, Diagnostic Medlab.
“I would have thought there were grounds to scrub the contract and go back to where we were.”
Auckland’s largest GP group, ProCare Health, said in a letter to the health boards that Labtests was continuing to fall well short of its promise it would match the DML service.
ProCare wants an urgent, independent review.
An independent review may not be a bad idea.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:02 am
Dr Hay of Mt Eden must be really pissed that DML aren’t renting a room from him any more.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:19 am
What has also got lost in the brouhaha over the change in contract provider is that the DHBs specifications for the new contract were for a radical reduction in the number of collection centres etc. It was most definitely NOT for business as usual with a competitor trying to score the contract by changing conditions and cutting services.
Having said that, as a patient I have experienced no problem with Labtests or their services or facilities and as an observer I have some doubts about the complaints as they appear on the service to be mostly subjective and not evidence based. There must have been a few real sparks amongst the smoke though for this to be going on and on and on and …..
November 4th, 2009 at 10:20 am
This mess is not the fault of labtests but the fault of the Auckland DHB who have been grossly negligent in supplier management of critical services.
The sole responsiblity is the DHB, and those in favour of awarding to labtests should be sacked.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:37 am
David, you’ve been suckered. You are demeaning yourself by becoming a publicist for a small venal group whose tactics right from the start have been deplorable.
[DPF: Get real. When the Chairman of the DHB (who granted the contract and would be expected to defend it) says he was lied to, that is massively significant. I've actually been quite careful to never take a position on DML vs Labtests, and have criticised both when I believe it is justified. I think an independent review is the best way to get fact, rather than rhetoric from people who are convinced one side is evil and one side good]
November 4th, 2009 at 10:39 am
I think the biggest share of the fault here is with the DHB’s, but it also seems that Labtests have made some significant errors. Particularly as was reported last night, that they missed cancerous cells on a sample and it was only picked up because the doctor got a second opinion. Regardless of any beaurocratic bunglings (around awarding the contract etc), that sort of thing is life threatening and below the standard anyone could reasonably expect.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:50 am
Hey Adolf …… read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest my post. I was pointing the bone at the DML cheer squad. However even you can’t deny that there appear to be at least some problems (not entirely unexpected and probably blown out of all proportion). As someone who looks behind the rhetoric, emotion and bluster and works almost entirely with numbers I do find it delporable that the complaints are not backed up with real evidence and everything is anecdotal.
If it is all BS then we certainly have some prima donnas among the medical profession (a group that makes its living by noting observable facts) who must realise that they will look like turkeys when the numbers are finally revealed.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:54 am
RightNow, even Sneddon admits that they have no baseline performance data from DML’s tenure against which to measure Labtests. One would expect some figures on percentage of false results that are expected, and if anyone tells you that DML had a 100% “correct analysis rate” with a straight face you can call them for what they are.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:56 am
The Auckland DHB is the real villain in all of this. They have grossly mismanaged the situation in almost every way.
It is appalling (yet sadly familiar) that Snedden has not quit, or been fired. Instead he uses the the modern scoundrel’s tactic of using some admitted failings as an excuse to stay in the job, “to fix the problem”.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:57 am
david, I was talking to David Farrar, not david commenter. Or I thought I was.
November 4th, 2009 at 10:58 am
An independent review… WTF… Follow the Labour model, let the company tendering for the business re-write sections of the RFP and award the contract without a competitive bid process. Saves heaps of time and friends of ministers don’t need to waste effort sharpening their pricing pencils. Ask Hausmann & Common-sense-King… they know how to make all this work without all this accountability nonsense.
November 4th, 2009 at 11:02 am
Fuck me. After the shit thats been uncovered in the NZ DHB scene over the past few years you’d be hard pressed to give much credence to any vested incumbent.
Lets see the numbers.
November 4th, 2009 at 11:08 am
@ Mr Fiinkensein: I believe that you are correct in this. It is now extremely difficult to disentangle any legitimate complaint against Labtests from deliberately-sown misinformation. At some stage, I expect another story to be told about this process.
November 4th, 2009 at 11:14 am
I’ve heard from Southern Labs in Dunedin, the sister company of Labtests who have been called into help out, think they’re a hopeless case, and they’re over trying to help them out to fix problems.
November 4th, 2009 at 11:16 am
I don’t think it’s Pat Snedden’s fault at all – Wayne Brown was Chair of the Auckland DHB and pushed this through. Snedden is Chair now, and as Chair must carry the bucket, but he wasn’t the architect of all this.
On paper it made a lot of sense, good savings for the DHB and the promise of a still efficient service. The fact that Labtests haven’t been able to deliver (and they haven’t) up to required standard is of real concern.
DML was complacent and assumed they would simply get thier contract renewed without any chellenge, and were gob-smacked to find they had been undercut. Whether we need something as extensive as DML’s range of services, collection centres etc is another debate.
I think the DHB should have split the contract and worked with two providers so they were competing with each other, instead of handing the whole lot over to one untested new player, but it’s too late now.
November 4th, 2009 at 11:33 am
@Adolf, fair ’nuff.
November 4th, 2009 at 11:56 am
@Mike S – don’t worry there is plenty of blame to go round on this one!
Wayne Brown chaired the epic fail of the contracting but Snedden was and still is on the Board responsible for the epic fail of the implementation.
You have hit the nail on the head about splitting the contract – the fact that they went for a “big bang” total switchover – which anyone who knows anything about such matters knows is almost destined to fail – and now complain they were “mis-led”, proves they are complete amatuers who had no idea what they were doing.
November 4th, 2009 at 12:19 pm
IMO the fundamental problem was a contract arrangement where the whole lot comes up for grabs in one go, It goes without saying that the outgoing incumbent is going to try and skewer the new operator in anyway possibe. For example the outgoing operator can put restraint of trade clauses in staff contracts – while these do not always stand up legally, an employer can foment enormous mischief with them.
It seems to me the trick in these things is to over promise while remaining an air of credibility and to structure the tender in such a manner that the price tag looks reasonable, but the supplier can ’slam in’ with extras. Another trick is to under price then threaten to walk if it is not renegotiated at a point when the client is in a weak position (I suspect this is the modus operandi of IT contractors – INCIS ring a bell?).
November 4th, 2009 at 12:26 pm
OK I am in the health industry but have no vested (or other) interest in labs except for hoping to get a fast reliable and accurate service.
I attended a meeting recently after which I can only express my complete lack of confidence in Labtests as hospital specialist after specialist listed their patients with incorrect or inadequate path results. One person commented “do the managers and DHB members realise that they have not just destroyed a perfectly functioning “Jewel in the Crown”
of Auckland Healthcare for short-term cost savings but they have destroyed clinical working relationships here for a decade or more that will have repercussions for patient care through that entire period”.
I am moved to wonder if there have been any resignations and whether any DHB Board member has the decency to not stand at the next election? Surely the Minister should bar any current Auckland DHB Board member from standing again as an “unfit person”? And surely the other Boards are equally at fault for failure to recognise the unbelievably well-heralded
fiasco that has resulted?
November 4th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
@thehawkereturns – I’ve heard similar stories from friends in the sector.
This is going to go down in Management School texts as a perfect example of hot not to carry out major change.
And yes, some of those people on the Board, and a few who were high up in DHB management who pushed it, should go.
November 4th, 2009 at 2:09 pm
WTF Adolf, your pathetic little PR campaign has bottomed out for good now. Ever heard of the Contractual Remedies Act… misrepresentation = cancellation + expectation damages. That means ADHB can cancel the contract and sue for the intended savings. A win win for Auckland.
It would be nice if WOBH and CK had the dignity to bail on their campaigns about now, although I suspect we will hear the usual PR crap from WO (who has accused me of being an employee of both DML and Fidelity thus far).
November 4th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
When the cops come for me I hope Labtests take my DNA, should be pretty safe, they’ll lose it.
November 4th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
I hope LabTests take my DNA. lmfao
November 4th, 2009 at 5:37 pm
Why Ernesto? Bloggers took up the case (I know I did) because DML were running a guerilla style campaign entirely of their own self-interest and no one was questioning them.
It is now even more clear that the whole handover was spiked by the losing party, politicised by so called “professionals” being the medics who have their hands in every pie in town so there is practically no independence or objectivity left in the entire profession.
If Labtests have lied to the DHB then cancel their entire contract. Do it. Simple – if the DHB have the balls to do it as it’s a multi-hundred million dollar call. Labtests should be sending lawyers letters to the DHB about now to that particular DHB head and associated given it is common knowledge in Auckland circles that the contract has a clause in it that prohibits parties from publicly criticising the other parties, hence Labtests careful approach to the media so far. (DML clearly aren’t a party to that are they having run rampant through all forms of guerilla warfare).
Issue is that the DHB’s are in it donkey deep all round. Labtests have agreed and participated in the DHB overseeing the project, therefore how could the DHB miss any quality and safety process?
As for this:
“Doctors recounted problems including near-misses for their patients, alleged misdiagnosis, slow turn-around times for results, unusual results, a flood of unwanted faxes, difficulty getting to speak to a pathologist, and a pathologist not seeming to understand his role of advising a GP”.
Yeah, and how do GP’s (and hospitals) perform in the areas of waiting times, difficulty in communications with patients, near-misses, accessibility….pot kettle, white coat.
The whole thing has become a whirl of politics and self-interest and shown that GP’s surely aren’t the warm, cuddly trusted friends of the family that everyone thinks they may be.
They seem to be sitting back and praying for a death related to the service. That funnily enough has not happened yet has it?
You want an independent review.
I say the problem is so bad politically now that could you actually find anyone left with the knowledge required who is independent enough to review it?
[And no Ernesto, that's not going to be you sniping at bloggers from the sidelines is it, with little productive informed contribution to about pretty much everything you comment on?]
November 4th, 2009 at 6:48 pm
CK: “You want an independent review.”
No, I want them to cancel the contract under the Contractual Remedies Act and seek expectation damages ie what they would have got if LabRats representation had been true.
I don’t believe you, WO and his pet doctor Adolf weren’t paid, or at least doing favours for buddies on the LabTests campaign. As a consumer of Lab services it stood out like dogs balls that you weren’t on the patients side. It was orchestrated guerilla PR at is sleaziest hallmarked by your ‘hypochondiacs’ attack (actually my daughter is the patient). As lacking in objectivity as WO’s claim I work for LabTests (AND fidelity). LMAO
November 4th, 2009 at 7:36 pm
Cactus, you may be right – a letter may be on its way to the DHB. Check out this press release:
http://business.scoop.co.nz/2009/11/04/labtests-patient-survey-confirms-quality-care/
The most telling comment:
“”In the past 24 hours, there has been reference made to Labtests misleading the DHBs with regard to quality and safety. Labtests and Healthscope have at all times acted in good faith and allowed the DHBs full visibility into its operations and quality and safety systems.
On 2 July 2009 the DHBs conducted an audit of Labtests that reviewed the quality and technical systems prior to the laboratory formally commencing business. The audit report complemented Labtests quality management systems.”"
November 4th, 2009 at 7:41 pm
I’ve had to use the sister company, Southern Community Labs, when they began trying for a push into the North Island. They promised service standards that were clearly going to be difficult or impossible to meet.
And guess what? It didn’t work out. But they did get the contract on the basis of their promises.
Sounds familiar.
November 4th, 2009 at 7:47 pm
Dearest Ernesto
“Favours for buddies” – ergh – I don’t have any “buddies” in eith……..well actually I thought I did in Hooton but he paid for Bomber to run his campaign for DML didn’t he? And if any money has been paid for the apparent “campaign” for Labtests I’m yet to bloody see any!
It must be awfully confusing for you that our (WO’s, Adolf as well) VRWC “buddy” Hooton was actually on the other side of the debate. Mindfuck.
See Rachael’s comment beneath….the DHB conducted their own audit and Labtests passed it.
Back to the drawing board on that one “buddy”.
CK
November 4th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
HMM. BUT the customers are clearly saying that Lab Tests and the DHB’s are not up to the standards expected by the customers. Lawyers are not known for being good customer advocates at the best of times whereas they are well known as being paid contract protectors. Lately of course the judiciary have leaned away from the strict word for word definition of law and contracts and are more inclined to consider the intent. e.g. a number of tax rort cases which have currently caused a few to reconsider lawyers advice on tax structuring. Something that CK attempts to justify as well. CK you are losing the plot.
Times are a changing and bullying lawyers are in their decline.
More strength to the customer.
November 4th, 2009 at 9:05 pm
Viking2 – isn’t it grand that the rule of law in a country is diminishing and there is commercial uncertainty in its application despite gaining rulings in advance as to validity? Does wonders for running a business with any certainty doesn’t it?
What “customers” do you refer to?
Taxpayers are “customers” of the IRD – their strength is diminishing it seems with waffly interpretation.
Customers of Labtests are whom? I would have thought it was the people requiring the service. All of whom are still getting the service, so far without any fatalities (contrary to the prayers of the doomsdayers).
This latest outburst covered by David here has been by Doctors from Three Kings, City Med and Dr Hay – all of whom appear to have once received from DML hefty payments to collect specimens and rent rooms gaining income of some 100,000’s of dollars so have a vested interest in the situation financially ie. not independent.
Labtests weren’t invited to the meeting and there were some 60 doctors in attendance from a possible 4800 doctors and clinicians (some 1.25% of those affected). Awesome quorum there.
Sounds more like something of an LEC process than democracy to me.
November 4th, 2009 at 11:18 pm
Ernesto appears to be a paid political staffer of some variety (cheap and nasty undoubtably), perhaps a union flunkie or wannabe.