Organisation of medicine is puzzling

Gosford Hospital is being rebuilt, so understandably seems congested.

The hospital seems understaffed, hence the nurses and doctors seem overworked.

Having spent time there in July, it was obvious to me that conditions in the reception area and in the emergency wards seemed to be frenetic.

Arriving at about 4.30pm on a Saturday was possibly the wrong time, as many ambulances with patients were waiting outside.

After hours in an emergency ward, I was awoken from a disturbed sleep to be told that I would be admitted at about 11.30pm and would go to a ward at 3am but would be moved in the morning as that was a one-bed ward.

I observed over the next few days that among the busiest staff were the wardspersons who pushed the beds from ward to ward.

"Playing musical beds" I called it, shoving them into any vacant spaces found.

I ended up at last in the Maternity Ward with several other older women, evidently the birthrate was low at that point in time.

One bemused obstetrician poked his head into the ward and asked me was I pregnant, bored stiff, I answered "Yes" and he went chuckling down the corridor.

This ward proved to be lucky for me as the nurses were very caring, seemed to have more time, and the space was not congested.

This should not be misinterpreted as a criticism of the nursing staff or the hospital doctors, as it was obvious that they were indeed overworked.

The causes seem to be manifold, and an obvious one arrived at by many is the demise of bulk-billing due to inadequate recompensation to GPs and the attacks on the level of care through Medicare by politicians.

Due to the cost of both doctors' visits and the prescribed drugs to the lower earners, the patients turn up at public hospitals in droves.

I can remember waiting at public hospitals for specialised attention as a child with my mother and waiting hours in the last century.

It could be that the organisation of medical science has been outstripped by the scientific discoveries of drugs for the treatment of many diseases or more likely that the profit motive should not be the primary factor tor treatments to save human beings.

The organisation of medicine in society as a whole is puzzling to mere mortals and one wonders if the mystique of it all remains at the level of witch doctoring.

What do you think as consumers?

Enid Harrison, Woy Woy