Posted by Michael Wonder on 23 Oct 2017
Health care underfunded for too long
23 October 2017 - The death of an elderly man - who broke his hip and died after surgery was delayed for too long - is yet another tragic consequence of a shamefully underfunded public health system.
The Health and Disability Commissioner has found the 78-year-old man, who died in 2013, did not get reasonable care from the Waikato District Health Board.
The commissioner found that the hospital board had failed to get the man total hip replacement surgery in the correct amount of time or provide adequate post-operative care.
The man was initially scheduled for immediate surgery, but that was delayed due to an unusually high volume of acute patients requiring surgery that day.
