Community GPs stretched
by Mark Sawyer
Medical clinics across the Wellington region are feeling the pressure of this winter?s swine flu outbreak with some clinics being forced to turn patients away. And it?s not just the H1N1, or Swine Flu, increasing the demand on Doctors and nurses available time. Some clinics have seen a spike in general illnesses this winter compound their already stretched resources. Newlands Medical Centre Practise Manager, Judith Albertson, is referring patients from outside the region back to their local clinics on a regular basis. ?We?re completely booked up and struggling to cope. Each day we?re running behind schedule because we get urgent walk-ins to the clinic, which we do our best to fit in. It?s difficult to tell people from outside our district we can?t see them, but it?s the situation we faced with.? ?We?re telling people on the phone not to come down to the clinic in the first instance, but wait for call back from our nurses to assess the situation.? Judith Albertson says from a staff of nine doctors, six are working on a part-time basis. The clinics had to convert a space into a temporary isolation room for those suspected to have swine flu. ?There?s a higher demand on medical services in the region due to population. Churton Park and Newlands are large growth areas and unfortunately few clinics in Hutt Valley are able accept new patients at the moment.? Meanwhile, Mana Medical Centre Practice Manager, Kellie Priest, has seen an increase in patients with general ear and chest infections mixed in with those concerned they?ve contracted swine flu. ?We?re receiving more than 100 calls a day to the clinic from people worried they have swine flu. This time last year it was 30 calls a day.? The clinic?s also set up an isolation room and increased the number of nurses and other staff to take the calls of concerned people. ?Fortunately we employed two new doctors before the swine flu pandemic hit this winter and we?ve had to increase the number of appointments in the daily schedule so we can see patients on the same day.? She says the clinic is accepting able to new patients, but they?re almost at their limit. Across at the Johnsonville Medical Centre, with a staff of 14 doctors and 12 nurses, they?re unable to accept new patients from outside their area. Practise Manager, Lynne Alo, says they?ve had to put in place new ad-hoc management systems to cope with the demand from patients within their own region. ?We?re able to see people within a 24 hour period. But we?re pushed hard. We?ve had to create an area only for suspected swine flu patients at the clinic and we?re fortunate enough to take on three new doctors just before the beginning of winter.? She also identifies population growth in the Johnsonville area as a primary reason for the greater demand on their services. The Capital & Coast District Health Board, which works with Primary Healthcare Organisations in the Northern region of Wellington, Head of Primary Care, Vicky Noble, says she?s in daily contact with the medical clinics in the region. "Current feedback is that, in general, practices are coping, although there are some which are under stress. The Community Based Assessment Centre option remains open to us, but we have no immediate plans to set one up at this point in time."
