Patients still in limbo about public holiday

Transcript: AMA Queensland President, Dr Maria Boulton, 4BC, Brisbane Live with Neil Breen, Thursday 15 September 2022

Subject: Need for clarity around public holiday and elective surgery

NEIL BREEN:   Dr Maria Boulton, are you still confused [about hospital arrangements on the Day of Mourning public holiday]?

DR MARIA BOULTON:   Yes, I am. And I did ring Minister Grace Grace's office this afternoon to seek clarification as to what is meant by ‘case-by-case basis’, and we were referred to Queensland Health. By that stage, we'd already written to Queensland Health asking for clarification as to who exactly is going to be affected next Thursday. So we haven't heard back yet.

NEIL BREEN:   We're probably just dealing - in the realms of major incidents and things like that, emergency surgeries, they're always taking care of, whether it's Christmas Day or Good Friday or anything. This is in the elective surgery area. If I was booked for elective surgery next week, say at the PA Hospital, basically I'd have no idea, would I, Dr Boulton. No idea.

DR MARIA BOULTON:   Basically, you wouldn't. And if you take the words of the Minister, Grace Grace, this morning, you would be waiting for a phone call or a notification to see whether or not it's going to go ahead, which gets really frustrating for patients. Also, it's not just elective surgeries. We're also waiting to see what's going to happen to people who have outpatient appointments, investigations, day treatment, et cetera. We just don't know. It's all up in the air. And like everybody else, it's very important for our patients to find out, which is why we continue to seek clarification.

NEIL BREEN:   Yeah. Well, there'd be people booked in for radiation, for chemo, follow-up appointments with specialists, initial appointments with specialists after getting a bad scan and they're worried they might have cancer or something like that. Those things will all fall by the wayside, I think, Dr Boulton.

DR MARIA BOULTON:   Yeah, absolutely. And there's also people who would be booked in for elective surgeries who would've been waiting for it for a long, long time -

NEIL BREEN:    Forever.

DR MARIA BOULTON:   ... and wondering whether or not they will be rescheduled and when that's going to happen. We can only continue asking and we will continue to do that until we hear a better answer. And we hope that all these people who are waiting to have treatment on that day, that it continues as normal, but yeah, we're waiting to hear like everybody else.

NEIL BREEN:   And just quickly, what about at a local GP level? They'll probably operate as a public holiday like they normally would?

DR MARIA BOULTON:   Yeah, most definitely. Some GP clinics are able to open up on public holidays and they will be open. The rest, if they have the staff, of course, because as we said, it's a very last minute holiday where childcare will be non-existent as well. So if they can, they will. But we would assume that the rest who don't normally open on public holidays won't.

NEIL BREEN:   Okay. Dr Maria Boulton, the AMA Queensland President. Thanks so much for your time this afternoon.