Cheung Gary, Sims Adam, Copeland Bronwyn, Collins Chris, Bharathan Sires
Department of Psychological Medicine, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.
Capital and Coast District Health Board, Wellington, New Zealand.
Australas Psychiatry. 2018 Aug;26(4):405-409. doi: 10.1177/1039856218765891. Epub 2018 Apr 5.
To survey the Psychiatry of Old Age (POA) services and workforce in New Zealand (NZ).
The NZ branch of Faculty of POA contacted the POA lead clinician and/or service manager of the 20 district health boards (DHBs) and completed a survey based on variables used in two similar previous national surveys.
Seventeen services responded. We found acute inpatient beds and clinical staff time are funded differently across DHBs. Although there has been an increase in non-medical clinical staff time in the community teams, most DHBs are not planning to increase their medical staff time in the next 3 years. Specialist services for people with intellectual disabilities and young-onset dementia, and older people with substance use disorder are generally not provided within POA services.
A wider POA and non-POA services mapping is required to determine the level of services for clinical populations that have high and complex clinical needs. DHB funders should review the expected population growth in people aged 65+ and consider increasing the funding for these under-served clinical populations.
调查新西兰老年精神病学（POA）服务及工作人员情况。
POA学院新西兰分会联系了20个地区卫生委员会（DHB）的POA首席临床医生和/或服务经理，并基于之前两项类似全国性调查中使用的变量完成了一项调查。
17项服务机构做出了回应。我们发现，各地区卫生委员会为急性住院病床和临床工作人员时间提供的资金有所不同。尽管社区团队中非医疗临床工作人员的时间有所增加，但大多数地区卫生委员会在未来3年不打算增加医疗工作人员的时间。POA服务通常不提供针对智力残疾和早发性痴呆患者以及患有物质使用障碍的老年人的专科服务。
需要更广泛地绘制POA和非POA服务图谱，以确定对临床需求高且复杂的临床人群的服务水平。地区卫生委员会资助方应审查65岁以上人群预期的人口增长情况，并考虑增加对这些服务不足的临床人群的资金投入。
