June 10, 2026 • 14 mins
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Unfortunately, we know that there is another Code yellow that's
been declared earlier in the week at Royal Darwin and
Palmerston Regional Hospitals as pressure continues to mount well and
on this occasion on intensive care, critical care and emergency departments.
Now Royal Darwin Hospital and the Palmerston Regional Hospital also dealing,
(00:20):
but particularly Royal Darwin dealing with a surge in patient
presentations following the long weekend, as I understand that some
elective surgeries requiring ICU support have been postponed, while health
authorities are urging people with non life threatening conditions to
use Darwin and Palmerston urgent care clinics. Now joining us
(00:41):
in the studio to talk more about this is the
head of the AMA, the Australian Medical Association here in
the Northern Territory, Doctor John Zorbist. Good morning to you.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Good morning Katie, Good morning to everybody listening this morning.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Now, doctor Zorbis tell us a code yello declared will
both our major hospitals, Royal Darwin and indeed Palmeston Region. All.
How's the state of the health system at the moment?
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, not great as you can imagine. We've been here
multiple times saying that we're over capacity every day, so
whether it's a Code yellow or not doesn't make a
huge difference. The hospital is dangerously full. Last time we
pointed out that it wasn't just you know, a lot
of the bed block previously was because of certain types
of beds, so not enough stroke beds, not enough cardiology beds.
But at that time we said, look, these are just beds.
(01:25):
Where's just literally we've started to even even at a
code yellow. Now we're still out of space. And I
think it's clear this time you can see that things
have gotten worse. We're talking about more canceled surgeries, more
acuity in other areas of the hospital. It's not just
a story of the emergency department being too full. And
so this is exactly what we said would happen, and
it's continuing to happen well, And.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
The disappointing part about it is it's continuing to happen.
We know that our healthcare stuff run off your feet
like there's no other way to put it, and continue
to be and then I am just getting really frustrated
with what feels like me banging my head against a
wall when I get the opportunity to speak to some
of the decision makers. I mean yesterday, I'm not sure
if you heard, but I had Emma McBride, who's one
(02:04):
of the Assistant ministers federal ministers on the show and she,
you know, I was asking her about additional health funding
and also you know, about maternity services, and I really
didn't feel like we're being listened to, to be honest with you, Yeah, look.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
I completely agree with you. I did get a chance
to listen to the interview and the Assistant Federal Minister
for Rural and Regional Health should have a better handle
on healthcare funding in the Northern territory. That should be
bread and butter for that minister. So it was a
real shame to hit that unfamiliarity with the problems that
we're facing. She kept talking about the additional sixty seven
million that's coming in three weeks, and there's no reference
(02:41):
to what mechanism that's coming through, who's responsible for it,
what's tied to it. It's just a figure. It's a
promise and I'm not interested in promises. We've said this
before on this show. We need to see the money
in the bank, right because we've been dangled promises forever.
Health funding is complicated, right, there's a lot of moving pieces.
I want to try and explain it if I can
in a very minute. Let's do this, right, So Katie,
(03:01):
you get a new job. Yep, it's a sad day
for radio. But you've got a new job. And seven
of your other mates get new jobs as well, the
same job. They've got weird names because they had weird parents.
New South Wales, Victoria wa. Right, Okay, your job's the hardest.
You have to travel the longest distances and it's a
job on the tools, so you need tools to do
the job to get the outcome. Right. Then your boss
says you're going to get paid seven percent less than
(03:23):
your mates. When you ask why, there's no reason. It's
just naff, you know, distraction, they just say, oh, well,
you know, it is what it is. So you get
paid seven percent less off for bat and then your
boss gives all your mates a car. You don't get one, right,
So your mates get the tools to do the job,
but you just have to make do and get your
own car and bail yourself out. You petition your boss,
You say, look, maybe you should pay us and resource
(03:45):
us according to the job that we need to do.
And the boss says, look, instead of same work, same pay,
we're just going to occasionally give you crumbs once a
year to bail out your problem. But it won't be
enough to actually fix the problem that is healthcare funding
in the NT in thirty.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Seconds makes me feel infuriated just thinking.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
About it, doesn't It doesn't that us. This is the
core problem, and so you know, we keep getting these
every now and then there's some side deal, some little
bailout that is never ever the amount we need. And
we don't want handouts. We want what is fair. We
want the structures that fund our health system to be fair.
So if you are in Sydney or if you are
in Ramiginning, you get the same amount of effort put
(04:24):
into your health care and we just do not see
that in the terror from What.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
Made me feel really frustrated yesterday as well is it
was like, well, we're giving you this sixty seven million dollars,
so you need to find like the health department there
needs to find ten million for maternity in that and
then I'm thinking, well, hang on a second, that's sixty
seven millions for the whole of the Northern Territory. It's
you know, like it's it. You've bailed out Tasmania, You've
bailed out other locations. What's wrong with us? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (04:49):
Yeah, you know that's sixty seven million. It's also kind
of like you know, me taking one hundred dollars off
you and giving you back fifty. We know that's a shortfall.
So even the Nhira agreement, it's seven hundred and four
one million over five years. That's not our you know
that they're not our projections. Ours are one billion over
five years. And that is just to bring us to
the starting line.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Where do we go from here? John, Because it really
feels as though, like you and I have had so
many discussions over the last six months, and you know,
we as Territorians understand that our health system is underfunded
and that you know, we realistically need some further support
from the federal government. We I get it that, you know,
(05:29):
people think, oh, we've got to stop asking for handouts
from the Feds. But we're talking about our health care
system and we're falling apart at the seams. Where do
we go from here? When it feels like we're not
being listened to and we're sort of giving, you know,
being told, well, you've got this additional sixty seven million
dollars and you've got some additional things like you know,
more more bulk billing locations, and we're you know, we're
(05:52):
moving ahead. But it's just not enough.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Yeah, we need just everybody to do their job and
do their job well, so we know our frontline staff
are doing their job right, that much is clear. The
federal government and our representatives in federal government, our local members,
our senators, both sides of the fence, need to be
talking to those in Canberra who are responsible for the models,
not just the day to day political announcements. Not another
(06:15):
urgent care center, not another ribbon, not another weird initiative. Right,
we need to talk about the way we fund things.
We need to make material change. That stuff's hard, it's boring.
It's really hard to do a press release on and
look fantastic and that's why it doesn't get done. But
we need more pressure there to make sure that the
underlying models are designed to actually fund healthcare in Australia
as per your need, not as per how many voters
(06:36):
there are in your electorate. The other side of this coin, too,
is our territory government. They don't get off free here either.
I don't want to hear another politician tell me about
the record spend on health territory or federal, because that's
how inflation works. Ever spend less. The Chiefness was on
your show, I think, first of June talking about the
record spend in health and on the ten million dollars
(06:58):
maternity when you asked about you know, is that just
going to come out at sixty seven? So just saying
things like health just needs to get on and do it.
They can just go ahead and make those decisions. They
can definitely do it. Last I checked, it's their health system, right,
this is they. That kind of language is really concerning
to me. It means health is an afterthought. In that
NT budget, we saw twenty one million dollars taken away
(07:18):
from outp appropriations. That's twenty one million dollars less in
health to keep the lights on. In a four point
twenty five billion billion dollar infrastructure budget, we only saw
eight million for health care. That was only two regions,
Barkley and top End. That's the same amount of money
we're spending on and upgrading an intersection in Alice Springs
Shorts and Stewart Highway. So this is the kind of
you know, if we're talk where health sits in the
pecking order in terms of how the government feels about it,
(07:40):
there's a lot more we could be doing a territory loss.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
And the thing that I'm seeing at the moment is
that that may have been able to be the case
in previous years, right, But what I can see is
happening at the moment is health is coming to a head.
Like you know, some of the issues that we are
experiencing are really coming to a head. And people may
not realize how tough that is until they present to
(08:02):
the emergency department and there's not a bed for them. Yeah, absolutely,
you know, or they need to go into the hospital,
they need to go into a ward and there's no
space for them.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Yeah, territory and should not be finding this out when
they need the healthcare that they need.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
Yeah, now tell me, John, I know that obviously this
construction of the new thirty two bed ward it is
now complete at our DH does I mean, have we
got what we need to be able to make sure
that it's sort of serviced as well? Where is that at?
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Yeah? So this is a good new story. So thirty
two new beds in Royal Dalne Hospital desperately needed. It'll
be fantastic to see them come online. We're still waiting
on the actual firm timeline, but it is getting pretty
close now. They are thirty two real staffed, operational beds,
as best we know. Unless you hear otherwise from the
Minister and the CE, you know that we've got operational
(08:50):
funding there. We saw funding in the budget. It's always
unclear whether that's the complete number of beds, so when
they do come on your show, feel free to get
them to pin on that one. But these are real beds,
and specifically beds that can be used for barometric patients,
for renal patients, for medical patients. It gives us back
more bedstock in the rest of the tower. That does
take the pressure off. It's not a permanent fix, but
(09:12):
it does give us some breathing room.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Well, that is at least some good news. Now. One
of the things that the federal government is really sort
of blowing their own trumpesh about, or giving themselves a
bit of a patter on the back over I think
at the moment is the fact that the Northern Territory
has now got the highest GP bulk billing rate in Australia,
so eighty nine point eight percent of GP visits a
bulk build. They say that that bulk billing in the
(09:34):
Northern territories increase thirteen point seven percentage points over the
past year. Have you seen or does that make a difference.
Do you think when it comes to some of the
capacity issues that we are experiencing at our hospitals or
does it help.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Look, it's a bittersweet story. The increase in bulk billing
is good news, but I think the reasons are probably
less about government initiatives and more about the fact that
probably we've got more people on the territory who are
more eligible for bulk billing setups and funding streams. And
you know, they like to talk a lot about urgent
care centers now. On one hand, having better after ours
(10:10):
access to a GP is good news for everybody. But
I have to challenge them on the narrative that it's
helping our hospitals, because it's not. There is no compelling
or consistent system wide evidence that urgent care centers significantly
reduce overall emergency department presentations. And that's not just us.
The College of emergency medicine says the same thing. The
guys who were actually in our emergency departments, and it
(10:33):
has there's virtually zero evidence that they change hospital admission rates.
So yes, they increase access. But what we could have
done is taken the phenomenal amount of money we spent
on them and put it into our other system, our
GPS Medicare. We already had the system. We could have
just helped incentifize after our bulk billing services for our
GPS reduce. We know it gets more expensive to keep
(10:53):
clinics open past six pm. Let's focus on that. We've
opted for a new structure. Welcome any money in healthcare
have been spent better.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
Now We've just got a message from a listener. It says,
get akatie. Why isn't it ever mentioned the amount of
dollars spent by the Northern Territory government in sending us
into state for medical treatment. Imagine how much money could
be saved on patient travel and accommodation. Plus it will
save the mental psychological trauma for families when they cannot attend.
What do you say to that?
Speaker 2 (11:21):
One hundred percent? Our focus should be delivering care where
patients are not having to transfer them into state or
even intra territory. So we spend a phenomenal amount bringing
people from all around the territory to Darwin to Alice Springs.
You know, every avoidable hospital admission and we have the
highest rate of avoidable hospital admissions in the country. Every
avoidable hospital admission is an area where we could have
(11:43):
set up better structures to prevent the need for that.
Aero medical retrieval. We don't have cardiothracic surgery, we don't
have endovascular clot retrieval. These are services you have to
fly out of the territory for. We could step them up.
They need resourcing, their need time, and most importantly, they
need to be designed by the frontline staff who actually
know how these systems work.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Is it a situation where we just like, maybe we
have had some of those services in the past, but
we haven't been able to staff them. What's the guy.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
We have tried to step up cardiothoracics in the past
and the business case got almost all the way to
the top and then sort of just fell off the radar.
There is a supply and demand thing, right like you
want to deliver the care where it is the most
efficient and economical and safest to do so, so I
understand you know. For example, this week the Intensive Care
department had an ECHO case extracorporeal membrances oxygenation. Fancy way
(12:29):
of saying, put you on a machine to replace your
heart and lungs, so you're very, very very unwell if
you end up on m Now, we had an echo
initiation and transfer this week, the second one we've done
in the territory. You know, at the moment, that's once
a year. Now, I think what we've done here is
really clever. We've set up a model where we can
initiate it and then within twenty four forty eight hours
we're moving you to the specialist center where it can continue.
(12:50):
We probably can't justify keeping a service like that running
twenty four to seven in the territory, but we certainly
can do something like what we've got set up now.
It's about finding those right tipping points. It's complicated, but
it is an area of huge expense for the territory.
It's also an area I want to remind you listeners
retrieval in the top end. This is a federal responsibility
(13:11):
and it's one of the three federal responsibilities that our
territory government is currently have to having to bail out
the federal government. Not right, age if we.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Weren't paying for that, right.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Yeah, So, aged care, retrieval in the top end, and
remote primary care are three areas. Add up to last
time we did the math two hundred million, probably more
than that now they are federal responsibilities. Yesterday Emma mcride said,
you know these the Commonwealth is principally responsible for primary care. Yes,
yes they are, and they should be paying for those
three ticket items. That money should be funding the deficits
(13:40):
we have in our healthcare system, not bailing out the feds.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
John tomorrow morning on the on the show for the
week that was, we have got the Northern Territory Health Minister,
Steve Edgington. What's one message you'd like us to get
to him?
Speaker 2 (13:53):
I have to. I'll keep them short. Our message is
always the same, fund us properly and let doctors be doctors, right,
give us the resources we need to do the job,
not more than we need, but what we deserve and
what is fair. And secondly, let doctors be doctors. Get
the red tape, get the bureaucracy out of the way
of what stands between us and our patients so we
(14:15):
can deliver the best care that we possibly can to territories.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Well, doctor John Zorbis, we always appreciate your times, your time,
You never mince your words, and we needed G yesterday
to be texting in for us while we're talking to
m McBride for some background. Thank you as always, we
really appreciate it anytime gatie things.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Thank you,
Unfortunately, we know that there is another Code yellow that's
been declared earlier in the week at Royal Darwin and
Palmerston Regional Hospitals as pressure continues to mount well and
on this occasion on intensive care, critical care and emergency departments.
Now Royal Darwin Hospital and the Palmerston Regional Hospital also dealing,
(00:20):
but particularly Royal Darwin dealing with a surge in patient
presentations following the long weekend, as I understand that some
elective surgeries requiring ICU support have been postponed, while health
authorities are urging people with non life threatening conditions to
use Darwin and Palmerston urgent care clinics. Now joining us
(00:41):
in the studio to talk more about this is the
head of the AMA, the Australian Medical Association here in
the Northern Territory, Doctor John Zorbist. Good morning to you.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Good morning Katie, Good morning to everybody listening this morning.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Now, doctor Zorbis tell us a code yello declared will
both our major hospitals, Royal Darwin and indeed Palmeston Region. All.
How's the state of the health system at the moment?
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Yeah, not great as you can imagine. We've been here
multiple times saying that we're over capacity every day, so
whether it's a Code yellow or not doesn't make a
huge difference. The hospital is dangerously full. Last time we
pointed out that it wasn't just you know, a lot
of the bed block previously was because of certain types
of beds, so not enough stroke beds, not enough cardiology beds.
But at that time we said, look, these are just beds.
(01:25):
Where's just literally we've started to even even at a
code yellow. Now we're still out of space. And I
think it's clear this time you can see that things
have gotten worse. We're talking about more canceled surgeries, more
acuity in other areas of the hospital. It's not just
a story of the emergency department being too full. And
so this is exactly what we said would happen, and
it's continuing to happen well, And.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
The disappointing part about it is it's continuing to happen.
We know that our healthcare stuff run off your feet
like there's no other way to put it, and continue
to be and then I am just getting really frustrated
with what feels like me banging my head against a
wall when I get the opportunity to speak to some
of the decision makers. I mean yesterday, I'm not sure
if you heard, but I had Emma McBride, who's one
(02:04):
of the Assistant ministers federal ministers on the show and she,
you know, I was asking her about additional health funding
and also you know, about maternity services, and I really
didn't feel like we're being listened to, to be honest with you, Yeah, look.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
I completely agree with you. I did get a chance
to listen to the interview and the Assistant Federal Minister
for Rural and Regional Health should have a better handle
on healthcare funding in the Northern territory. That should be
bread and butter for that minister. So it was a
real shame to hit that unfamiliarity with the problems that
we're facing. She kept talking about the additional sixty seven
million that's coming in three weeks, and there's no reference
(02:41):
to what mechanism that's coming through, who's responsible for it,
what's tied to it. It's just a figure. It's a
promise and I'm not interested in promises. We've said this
before on this show. We need to see the money
in the bank, right because we've been dangled promises forever.
Health funding is complicated, right, there's a lot of moving pieces.
I want to try and explain it if I can
in a very minute. Let's do this, right, So Katie,
(03:01):
you get a new job. Yep, it's a sad day
for radio. But you've got a new job. And seven
of your other mates get new jobs as well, the
same job. They've got weird names because they had weird parents.
New South Wales, Victoria wa. Right, Okay, your job's the hardest.
You have to travel the longest distances and it's a
job on the tools, so you need tools to do
the job to get the outcome. Right. Then your boss
says you're going to get paid seven percent less than
(03:23):
your mates. When you ask why, there's no reason. It's
just naff, you know, distraction, they just say, oh, well,
you know, it is what it is. So you get
paid seven percent less off for bat and then your
boss gives all your mates a car. You don't get one, right,
So your mates get the tools to do the job,
but you just have to make do and get your
own car and bail yourself out. You petition your boss,
You say, look, maybe you should pay us and resource
(03:45):
us according to the job that we need to do.
And the boss says, look, instead of same work, same pay,
we're just going to occasionally give you crumbs once a
year to bail out your problem. But it won't be
enough to actually fix the problem that is healthcare funding
in the NT in thirty.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Seconds makes me feel infuriated just thinking.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
About it, doesn't It doesn't that us. This is the
core problem, and so you know, we keep getting these
every now and then there's some side deal, some little
bailout that is never ever the amount we need. And
we don't want handouts. We want what is fair. We
want the structures that fund our health system to be fair.
So if you are in Sydney or if you are
in Ramiginning, you get the same amount of effort put
(04:24):
into your health care and we just do not see
that in the terror from What.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
Made me feel really frustrated yesterday as well is it
was like, well, we're giving you this sixty seven million dollars,
so you need to find like the health department there
needs to find ten million for maternity in that and
then I'm thinking, well, hang on a second, that's sixty
seven millions for the whole of the Northern Territory. It's
you know, like it's it. You've bailed out Tasmania, You've
bailed out other locations. What's wrong with us? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (04:49):
Yeah, you know that's sixty seven million. It's also kind
of like you know, me taking one hundred dollars off
you and giving you back fifty. We know that's a shortfall.
So even the Nhira agreement, it's seven hundred and four
one million over five years. That's not our you know
that they're not our projections. Ours are one billion over
five years. And that is just to bring us to
the starting line.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Where do we go from here? John, Because it really
feels as though, like you and I have had so
many discussions over the last six months, and you know,
we as Territorians understand that our health system is underfunded
and that you know, we realistically need some further support
from the federal government. We I get it that, you know,
(05:29):
people think, oh, we've got to stop asking for handouts
from the Feds. But we're talking about our health care
system and we're falling apart at the seams. Where do
we go from here? When it feels like we're not
being listened to and we're sort of giving, you know,
being told, well, you've got this additional sixty seven million
dollars and you've got some additional things like you know,
more more bulk billing locations, and we're you know, we're
(05:52):
moving ahead. But it's just not enough.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Yeah, we need just everybody to do their job and
do their job well, so we know our frontline staff
are doing their job right, that much is clear. The
federal government and our representatives in federal government, our local members,
our senators, both sides of the fence, need to be
talking to those in Canberra who are responsible for the models,
not just the day to day political announcements. Not another
(06:15):
urgent care center, not another ribbon, not another weird initiative. Right,
we need to talk about the way we fund things.
We need to make material change. That stuff's hard, it's boring.
It's really hard to do a press release on and
look fantastic and that's why it doesn't get done. But
we need more pressure there to make sure that the
underlying models are designed to actually fund healthcare in Australia
as per your need, not as per how many voters
(06:36):
there are in your electorate. The other side of this coin, too,
is our territory government. They don't get off free here either.
I don't want to hear another politician tell me about
the record spend on health territory or federal, because that's
how inflation works. Ever spend less. The Chiefness was on
your show, I think, first of June talking about the
record spend in health and on the ten million dollars
(06:58):
maternity when you asked about you know, is that just
going to come out at sixty seven? So just saying
things like health just needs to get on and do it.
They can just go ahead and make those decisions. They
can definitely do it. Last I checked, it's their health system, right,
this is they. That kind of language is really concerning
to me. It means health is an afterthought. In that
NT budget, we saw twenty one million dollars taken away
(07:18):
from outp appropriations. That's twenty one million dollars less in
health to keep the lights on. In a four point
twenty five billion billion dollar infrastructure budget, we only saw
eight million for health care. That was only two regions,
Barkley and top End. That's the same amount of money
we're spending on and upgrading an intersection in Alice Springs
Shorts and Stewart Highway. So this is the kind of
you know, if we're talk where health sits in the
pecking order in terms of how the government feels about it,
(07:40):
there's a lot more we could be doing a territory loss.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
And the thing that I'm seeing at the moment is
that that may have been able to be the case
in previous years, right, But what I can see is
happening at the moment is health is coming to a head.
Like you know, some of the issues that we are
experiencing are really coming to a head. And people may
not realize how tough that is until they present to
(08:02):
the emergency department and there's not a bed for them. Yeah, absolutely,
you know, or they need to go into the hospital,
they need to go into a ward and there's no
space for them.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
Yeah, territory and should not be finding this out when
they need the healthcare that they need.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
Yeah, now tell me, John, I know that obviously this
construction of the new thirty two bed ward it is
now complete at our DH does I mean, have we
got what we need to be able to make sure
that it's sort of serviced as well? Where is that at?
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Yeah? So this is a good new story. So thirty
two new beds in Royal Dalne Hospital desperately needed. It'll
be fantastic to see them come online. We're still waiting
on the actual firm timeline, but it is getting pretty
close now. They are thirty two real staffed, operational beds,
as best we know. Unless you hear otherwise from the
Minister and the CE, you know that we've got operational
(08:50):
funding there. We saw funding in the budget. It's always
unclear whether that's the complete number of beds, so when
they do come on your show, feel free to get
them to pin on that one. But these are real beds,
and specifically beds that can be used for barometric patients,
for renal patients, for medical patients. It gives us back
more bedstock in the rest of the tower. That does
take the pressure off. It's not a permanent fix, but
(09:12):
it does give us some breathing room.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Well, that is at least some good news. Now. One
of the things that the federal government is really sort
of blowing their own trumpesh about, or giving themselves a
bit of a patter on the back over I think
at the moment is the fact that the Northern Territory
has now got the highest GP bulk billing rate in Australia,
so eighty nine point eight percent of GP visits a
bulk build. They say that that bulk billing in the
(09:34):
Northern territories increase thirteen point seven percentage points over the
past year. Have you seen or does that make a difference.
Do you think when it comes to some of the
capacity issues that we are experiencing at our hospitals or
does it help.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
Look, it's a bittersweet story. The increase in bulk billing
is good news, but I think the reasons are probably
less about government initiatives and more about the fact that
probably we've got more people on the territory who are
more eligible for bulk billing setups and funding streams. And
you know, they like to talk a lot about urgent
care centers now. On one hand, having better after ours
(10:10):
access to a GP is good news for everybody. But
I have to challenge them on the narrative that it's
helping our hospitals, because it's not. There is no compelling
or consistent system wide evidence that urgent care centers significantly
reduce overall emergency department presentations. And that's not just us.
The College of emergency medicine says the same thing. The
guys who were actually in our emergency departments, and it
(10:33):
has there's virtually zero evidence that they change hospital admission rates.
So yes, they increase access. But what we could have
done is taken the phenomenal amount of money we spent
on them and put it into our other system, our
GPS Medicare. We already had the system. We could have
just helped incentifize after our bulk billing services for our
GPS reduce. We know it gets more expensive to keep
(10:53):
clinics open past six pm. Let's focus on that. We've
opted for a new structure. Welcome any money in healthcare
have been spent better.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
Now We've just got a message from a listener. It says,
get akatie. Why isn't it ever mentioned the amount of
dollars spent by the Northern Territory government in sending us
into state for medical treatment. Imagine how much money could
be saved on patient travel and accommodation. Plus it will
save the mental psychological trauma for families when they cannot attend.
What do you say to that?
Speaker 2 (11:21):
One hundred percent? Our focus should be delivering care where
patients are not having to transfer them into state or
even intra territory. So we spend a phenomenal amount bringing
people from all around the territory to Darwin to Alice Springs.
You know, every avoidable hospital admission and we have the
highest rate of avoidable hospital admissions in the country. Every
avoidable hospital admission is an area where we could have
(11:43):
set up better structures to prevent the need for that.
Aero medical retrieval. We don't have cardiothracic surgery, we don't
have endovascular clot retrieval. These are services you have to
fly out of the territory for. We could step them up.
They need resourcing, their need time, and most importantly, they
need to be designed by the frontline staff who actually
know how these systems work.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Is it a situation where we just like, maybe we
have had some of those services in the past, but
we haven't been able to staff them. What's the guy.
Speaker 2 (12:08):
We have tried to step up cardiothoracics in the past
and the business case got almost all the way to
the top and then sort of just fell off the radar.
There is a supply and demand thing, right like you
want to deliver the care where it is the most
efficient and economical and safest to do so, so I
understand you know. For example, this week the Intensive Care
department had an ECHO case extracorporeal membrances oxygenation. Fancy way
(12:29):
of saying, put you on a machine to replace your
heart and lungs, so you're very, very very unwell if
you end up on m Now, we had an echo
initiation and transfer this week, the second one we've done
in the territory. You know, at the moment, that's once
a year. Now, I think what we've done here is
really clever. We've set up a model where we can
initiate it and then within twenty four forty eight hours
we're moving you to the specialist center where it can continue.
(12:50):
We probably can't justify keeping a service like that running
twenty four to seven in the territory, but we certainly
can do something like what we've got set up now.
It's about finding those right tipping points. It's complicated, but
it is an area of huge expense for the territory.
It's also an area I want to remind you listeners
retrieval in the top end. This is a federal responsibility
(13:11):
and it's one of the three federal responsibilities that our
territory government is currently have to having to bail out
the federal government. Not right, age if we.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Weren't paying for that, right.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Yeah, So, aged care, retrieval in the top end, and
remote primary care are three areas. Add up to last
time we did the math two hundred million, probably more
than that now they are federal responsibilities. Yesterday Emma mcride said,
you know these the Commonwealth is principally responsible for primary care. Yes,
yes they are, and they should be paying for those
three ticket items. That money should be funding the deficits
(13:40):
we have in our healthcare system, not bailing out the feds.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
John tomorrow morning on the on the show for the
week that was, we have got the Northern Territory Health Minister,
Steve Edgington. What's one message you'd like us to get
to him?
Speaker 2 (13:53):
I have to. I'll keep them short. Our message is
always the same, fund us properly and let doctors be doctors, right,
give us the resources we need to do the job,
not more than we need, but what we deserve and
what is fair. And secondly, let doctors be doctors. Get
the red tape, get the bureaucracy out of the way
of what stands between us and our patients so we
(14:15):
can deliver the best care that we possibly can to territories.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Well, doctor John Zorbis, we always appreciate your times, your time,
You never mince your words, and we needed G yesterday
to be texting in for us while we're talking to
m McBride for some background. Thank you as always, we
really appreciate it anytime gatie things.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Thank you,
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