Private hospitals were briefed on the changes on Thursday. They were told some more urgent categories of day surgery would still be allowed under the new rules,which will come into effect on Monday.
“Next week is the first week that we were coming back to any sense of normality – most surgeons are on holiday right now,they may not be looking at the news at all,” a senior Sydney surgeon not authorised to comment said,expressing concern about how hospitals would implement the restrictions on such a tight turnaround.
The backlog created by 2021’s elective surgery shutdown was significant. Data from the end of September showed theelective surgery wait list had reached 92,000 patients before procedures were gradually re-allowed.
The Royal Australasian College of Surgeons hadexpected the waiting list for procedures to grow significantly in early 2022,when people caught up on medical appointments missed during the lockdown.
“This was when we were planning to surge after the Delta shutdown,” said president of the college Dr Payal Mukherjee,who added the number of staff in isolation was “causing a lot of chaos in the system”.
NSW president of the Australian Medical Association Dr Danielle McMullen said the decision to suspend surgery was “inevitable” given the impact of rising case numbers on the hospital system “but not unavoidable”.
“Elective surgery is not ‘unnecessary surgery’,it is serious medical care and delaying that care impacts on the quality of life for many Australians,” she said.
“Elective surgery shouldn’t be a tap that government turns ‘on’ and ‘off’ to cover for serious cracks in our healthcare system.”
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Amid record numbers of staff on furlough,NSW Health Deputy Secretary Susan Pearce said on Wednesday the ministry planned to more than quadruple the number of vaccinations it was delivering at its state hubs,providing more than 300,000 shots a week by the end of January.
Opposition Leader Chris Minns said on Thursday the government should have avoided the need to consider restricting operations to keep the health system appropriately staffed,with case numbers needing to have been curtailed earlier.
“It shouldn’t have come to this;resources should have been put in place earlier,” he said.
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