New Zealand Surgeons Required To Determine Surgical Priority Based On Ethnicity of Patients – IOTW Report

New Zealand Surgeons Required To Determine Surgical Priority Based On Ethnicity of Patients

CDM:

A new policy that was released in February in New Zealand has surgeons in Aukland ‘disgusted’ because it requires them to confront “historical disparities in healthcare access” for Māori and Pacific island communities by taking a patient’s ethnicity into account as part of a new ranking system that determines priority for surgical procedures.

The new initiative, which is being implemented by Te Whatu Ora, Health New Zealand, uses an “Equity Adjuster Score” algorithm to assign surgical priority to patients based on the following factors: waitlist duration, clinical urgency, ethnicity, geographic location, and level of deprivation.

Māori and patients with a Pasifika background are elevated on the list while New Zealanders with a European background are downgraded for care.

Several surgeons have spoken out about the new system with one saying he was “disgusted” by it.

“It’s ethically challenging to treat anyone based on race, it’s their medical condition that must establish the urgency of the treatment,” the surgeon said.

“There’s no place for elitism in medicine and the medical fraternity in this country is disturbed by those developments,” he added. read more

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