Health Minister’s Instructions To DHBs Tickety Boo

“Health Minister’s Instructions To DHBs On Clinical Leadership Are Absolutely Tickety Boo”

“Health Minister Tony Ryall’s instructions to district health boards requiring them to institute effective clinical leadership are absolutely tickety boo, as Billy Connolly might say,” said Mr Ian Powell, Executive Director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists, today. Mr Powell was commenting on Mr Ryall’s Letter of Expectations to the Chairs of the 21 DHBs.

“He is requiring DHBs to foster a culture of effective clinical leadership because it is internationally recognised as a fundamentally driver for improved care. The Chairs of DHBs will be held to account for their performance in achieving this objective and they will also be required to directly hold to account their chief executives and senior management teams. Potentially, at the extreme end of things, failure to achieve effective clinical leadership might become a dismissible offence.”

“Achieving effective rather than tokenistic clinical leadership has long been a key objective of senior doctors and it is great to see the Minister giving this real grunt. DHBs have had uneven success in establishing genuine clinical leadership at all levels of their workings but overall they have fallen well short of what is needed. The opposite culture of top-down managerialism has been too prevalent and, as a result, destructive.”

“DHBs will also be required to improve staff retention rates. This is an excellent objective but a tough challenge. Achieving genuine clinical leadership in DHBs will help. But what will be absolutely critical is terms and conditions of employment that enable DHBs to compete effectively with Australia and with the private sector in New Zealand. Currently we simply can’t compete and our health system is suffering as a result.”

“Mr Ryall has put DHBs in a vice-like grip with his requirement that they deliver on the government’s priorities, such as increasing elective volumes, improving emergency departments and improving cancer treatment waiting times, but within budget. Genuine clinical leadership offers them a possible way out of this vice,” concluded Mr Powell.

ENDS

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