Posted by Michael Wonder on 08 Sep 2020
Nurse specialists say plight of severely ill bowel disease patients in NZ is bitterly unfair
8 September 2020 - Senior Clinical Nurse specialists caring for some of New Zealand’s sickest bowel disease patients say the Government has turned its back on their patients by refusing to fund routine, mainstream treatments that have been in use around the world for the past several years.
They say that in denying treatment for these severely ill patients the Government is heartless, negligent and totally out of step with all other first world countries*.
Marian O’Connor, clinical nurse specialist who cares for severely ill patients with Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, worked in the UK for 15 years and has seen first-hand the transformative benefits of the newer biologic medicines not available here.
“I was shocked when I arrived here to find how desperately out of date NZ is with regard to treating these terrible diseases.”
