Chair, Canterbury Charity Hospital Trust, Christchurch.
Associate Professor, School of Health Sciences and Social Work, Griffith University, Gold Coast Campus, Queensland, Australia.
N Z Med J. 2022 Apr 1;135:37-48.
To update activities of the Canterbury Charity Hospital (CCH) and its Trust over the eight-year period 2013 to end of 2020, following previous reports in 2010 and 2013.
CCH continued to provide free secondary elective healthcare services to some patients in the Canterbury Distinct Health Board (CDHB) region who were unable to access healthcare they needed through public hospitals and were unable to pay for private care. CCH's services were supplied by a large volunteer workforce, supported by a skeleton staff, and were financed solely by charitable giving. Changes occurred periodically in the quantity and nature of regional unmet healthcare need, largely due to changes in services provided by the CDHB. In order to accommodate these changes, major structural and infrastructural developments were necessitated at CCH.
Many healthcare services at CCH remained the same as before this period but new changes occurred there as a result of: (i) establishment of a flexible sigmoidoscopy day clinic for the management of fresh rectal bleeding in those under 50 years of age; (ii) requirement for a sudden increase in counselling services immediately after the terror attacks at Christchurch mosques; (iii) expansion of the Dental and Oral Surgery Service; and (iv) interruption of CCH service provision by the COVID-19 pandemic.
CCH continued to fill some of the regional unmet elective healthcare need. This is, however, a national problem as attested by the presence of a charity hospital in Auckland and another being planned for Invercargill. Hopefully present and future governments will appreciate that free universal access to secondary elective healthcare is not only a humane imperative, but also a sound economic investment.
继 2010 年和 2013 年的报告之后，更新 2013 年至 2020 年底期间坎特伯雷慈善医院（CCH）及其信托基金的活动。
CCH 继续为坎特伯雷地区卫生委员会（CDHB）区域内一些无法通过公立医院获得所需医疗服务且无法支付私人护理费用的患者提供免费的二级选修医疗服务。CCH 的服务由大量志愿者劳动力提供，由少量员工支持，并完全由慈善捐款资助。由于 CDHB 提供的服务发生变化，区域内未满足的医疗需求的数量和性质也定期发生变化。为了适应这些变化，CCH 需要进行重大的结构和基础设施发展。
CCH 的许多医疗服务与本报告所述期间之前相同，但由于以下原因发生了新的变化：（i）为 50 岁以下人群管理新的直肠出血建立了灵活乙状结肠镜日间诊所；（ii）基督城清真寺恐怖袭击后立即需要增加咨询服务；（iii）牙科和口腔外科服务扩大；（iv）CCH 服务因 COVID-19 大流行而中断。
CCH 继续满足部分区域未满足的选修医疗需求。然而，正如奥克兰慈善医院和因弗卡吉尔计划中的另一家慈善医院的存在所证明的那样，这是一个全国性的问题。希望当前和未来的政府能够认识到，免费普遍获得二级选修医疗保健不仅是人道的必要，也是合理的经济投资。
