“Most staggering decline in health system performance ever”

Former health official Michael Hundleby writes:

Te Whatu Ora just released a report describing its first year of performance.

The dryly named “Clinical Performance Metrics” report describes our 11 key health system performance measures for the year ended June 30, 2023. Unfortunately, it’s very technical language means it is hard for the public to understand what it is saying.

It is worth analysing the report as it reveals the overall health system performance is very poor and is getting worse. It records what is probably the most staggering decline in health system performance ever.

The decline is staggering. It is no surprise this report came out after the election.

The report is also deliberately unhelpful. It gives results for each former DHB area but fails to give an overall result for New Zealand, which is a key piece of information.

As time allows I will go through the report and do population weighted calculations for NZ, and blog them here so people can see the extent of the failure.

It is therefore little wonder emergency department (ED) presentations are up 5%, and in June 2023 over 28.8% of people waited in EDs for over 6 hours – up in one year from 24.1% who stayed over six hours.

When Labour came to power in 2017 only 7% of people were in EDs for more than six hours.

So the proportion waiting more than six hours has quadrupled.

With mental health a key Labour priority, how has that gone? Under 25-year-olds should be seen by a mental health specialist within three weeks of referral. In the year to July 1, 2023, 31.7% were not seen within three weeks. A year ago, 27.6% were not seen within three weeks.

Their big campaign promise in 2017 and Budget in 2019 was about mental health. Another failure.

Comments (63)

Login to comment or vote

Add a Comment