"Mistreatment"

My spouse was triaged at Karratha Health Campus along with my child, who was also triaged for asthma. My spouse had been feeling sick for the last two days, with congested nasal problems, a head cold and suspected bladder infection, suffering very high temperatures, back pain, a throbbing headache and started having chest pains. My spouse has a history of heart disease, they have a pacemaker and also suffers chronic health disease called diabetes and high blood pressure. They are on a cocktail of medication, all mentioned during triage. My spouse identifies as a First Nations person and falls under the bracket of disadvantaged from the time of birth because they are Aboriginal.

Allow me to educate you; the health status of Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples is poor in comparison to the rest of the Australian population. There remains a large inequality gap in Australia across all statistics. For example, there is an estimated gap of approximately 17 years between Indigenous and non-Indigenous life expectation in Australia.

Hence my seriousness when I feel the health and safety of my family is compromised by a major health service, such as the Karratha Health Campus, under WA Country Health Services.

So my questions is why was my spouse left waiting around a total of seven hours over two nights in triage only to leave without being seen.

With grave concerns for my spouse’s health and safety I rang the hospital several times, spoke to a doctor who answered my call, I felt they were rude and dismissive and then hung up on me, when I stated legal action. Finally I rang and spoke to Charmaine the night manager, may I add she was compassionate, understanding and listened as I expressed my concerns for my spouse’s health and safety. She suggested several times for my spouse to come back into emergency and be triaged for what would have been the third time, to which my spouse declined as they were too unwell to climb back into the car and walked back into emergency. Stating they would rather suffer at home and wait it out, if need be, we will call the ambulance and it seemed then we may be taken seriously and treated humanly.

Based on my experience, please see your mission statement and your vision and know that this has not been the case the last two nights, also note that if my spouse’s condition deteriorates, I will take legal action. I want this matter address, as I do not want another First Nations person to suffer and possibly die because of apparent medical negligence and racism/racial profiling, which is how my spouse and child was made to feel that night, your staff can deny this and I believe they will but unless you are a First Nations person you have no idea what it feels like to experience this sort of treatment and behaviour.

According to the Karratha Health Campus website;

Our Mission

To deliver and advance high quality care for country communities.

We are here to improve country people’s health and well-being, to care for the sick and to ensure that country communities can access high quality healthcare.

Our Vision

To be a global leader in rural and remote healthcare.

We aim to deliver services that meet or exceed standards and advance health outcomes for country communities. While we are proud of the services staff deliver, we know that there is scope for us to grow and improve. We want to be at the forefront of the new wave of healthcare, establishing ourselves as a global leader in regional and remote healthcare.

I suggest you take a look at your statements and ask yourself, are these statements true? And why? And how?

You state; As well as being a top-class health facility, the new Karratha Health Campus offers staff a modern, well situated workplace in the centre of the town? This is amazing for your staff, but in my opinion, without patients.