Budget squeeze harming patient care: AMA survey

Media release from the AMA (WA)

Lack of appropriate funding is affecting the quality of patient care in WA's public hospitals, according to a major survey undertaken by the AMA (WA).

The survey of 671 public hospital doctors also revealed that almost 85 % rate the State Government's performance in health as average to poor.

"The survey is a wake up call to the Government that their current approach to health is having serious consequences," said association President Prof Gary Geelhoed.

"Doctors at the coal face are telling us that because of Budget constraints they are struggling to provide best practice care, something the AMA warned would happen when the Government started restricting hospital budgets last year."

The survey, completed last week, drew responses from 398 senior doctors and 273 junior doctors.

Among senior doctors, almost 68% said that Budget constraints had affected their ability to provide patients with best practice care; 62% of junior doctors agreed.

The survey also showed that the majority of senior (57 %) and junior (75.3%) doctors don't support the new four-hour rule, which they claim is not being resourced properly and is affecting their work area.

"This initiative was supported by the medical profession because it was seen as a way of helping to ease the burden on emergency departments and, more importantly, result in a better and safer experience for patients," said Prof Geelhoed.

"But doctors were not expecting to operate under new rules with restrictions in staff and resources."

Other survey results include:

• Only 5.5% of senior doctors and 11.35% of junior doctors rate the WA Government's performance in health as good to excellent.
• The Commonwealth Government also rates poorly in health with only 13.8% of senior doctors and 14.5% of junior doctors prepared to give it a tick of approval.
• More than 40% of junior doctors believe consultants and senior registrars don't have sufficient time to help train them.
• 93.5% of junior doctors claim workload prevents them attending educational activities, 44.5% work un-rostered hours and almost 30% have problems getting un-rostered overtime approved.
• Prof Geelhoed said the fact that more than 670 doctors had responded to the survey was an indication of the depth of concern over the way the public hospital system was functioning in WA.

"The AMA (WA) has already raised many of these issues with the Acting Director General, Kim Snowball, and we're hopeful that through regular consultation with him and the Minister we can restore the standards of patient care that have been jeopardised," he said.

Read More