Rural Health a Success Story - Minister

Rural health services were a success story of the last five years, Health Minister Bill English told a rural health conference in Invercargill today.

"The map proves it. The common perception is that rural services have either vanished in recent years or are constantly under threat, but the map of new rural health centres and birthing units tells a different story.

"All over the country new services have been set up. They are run by local people to meet local needs. These are a new type of service and they will last.

"They are all unique, in that there are different combinations of services and different kinds of ownership. Some are run by community trusts, some trusts have Government assistance through the Community Trust Assistance Scheme, some are owned and run by bigger public hospitals, some are privately owned and run, and some are leased.

"The range of services in each can include:

- general practice services
- practice nurse services
- facilities for visiting specialists
- community service base (eg district nursing, home help)
- other treatment facilities (eg physio, public health)
- pharmacy services
- possibly GP beds
- birthing facilities

"In many cases these services are sited in old hospital buildings, breathing new life into places that had been overtaken by more modern health services. In other cases communities have decided that the old hospital is no longer the best place for health services, and have built new centres.

"At the next level up from these rural health centres are a number of small hospitals, which provide and will continue to provide a diverse range of services, including inpatient beds for day surgery.

"Other Government initiatives have particular signficance for rural services, such as the PRIME (Primary Response in Medical Emergency) initiative developed by the Health Funding Authority and ACC, nurse prescribing, and integrated care.

"The Otago Medical School and South Link Health have just announced a scheme which combines training doctors in rural medicine and getting more specialists into rural areas.

"There are still some areas where there is work to do, such as support for rural GPs, making sure that people who have to travel for the more complicated hospital procedures have reasonable travel and accommodation support, and better co-ordination of acute and emergency services.

"The Hospital Plan which is being worked on now is about making sure that people continue to have access to hospital services and that they have certainty about what hospital services there will be. These rural services are part of the Hospital Plan.

"All these initiatives combine to give me real confidence that our rural health services are in good shape and can only get better," said Mr English.

Mr English was speaking in Invercargill at Rural Health 2000, a conference organised by the Dunedin School of Medicine.