Mayor criticises DHB's lack of openness - 7/03/2007Mayor Michael Laws today said that the Whanganui District Health Board (DHB) still seemed to be suffering from a lack of transparency and openness in its dealings with the Wanganui public over health-related issues.
Mr Laws was referring to the decision of the DHB last week not to release the name of Dr Roman Hasil as the gynaecologist at the centre of numerous surgical blunders undertaken at Wanganui Hospital.
"I had hoped that the DHB would have learned from the paediatrician and obstetrician debacle of last year but it is apparent that they have not. The public of Wanganui are entitled to know who the guilty surgeon is so that those women who have had operations by this man can check the validity of those procedures. Just because you’re not pregnant now doesn't mean you won’t be in the future if there has been a bungled procedure."
Mr Laws said that yet again the DHB had produced negative headlines nationally and had its surgical competence publicly questioned.
If Dr Hasil had been proven incompetent in a relatively minor surgical procedure, then it begged the question of what other surgery he had performed that did not meet acceptable quality standards.
"I urge the DHB to give the public the full facts and not to hide any information that is relevant to the public health of our community. Until that occurs, there will always be the suspicion that the DHB is trying to hide something." |
