VISITING HOSPITAL

All hospital visitors are recommended to wear a medical face mask. Expand this message for information about visiting hospital.

Last updated:
13 March 2023

Some visitor restrictions for all Te Whatu Ora Waitaha Canterbury hospitals and health facilities remain in place, but we have relaxed others.

There is still a heightened risk to vulnerable people in hospital and so we recommend all people wear a mask when visiting any of our facilities and follow other advice designed to keep patients, staff and  visitors safe.

To keep everybody safe:

  • Visitors or support people must not visit our facilities if they are unwell. Do not visit if you have recently tested positive for COVID-19 and haven’t completed your isolation period.
  • Patients may have more than one visitor, except in some situations such as multi-bed rooms where it can cause overcrowding.
  • Surgical/medical masks are recommended to be worn at all sites. Masks will be provided if you don’t have one.
  • For Specialist Mental Health Services everyone is strongly encouraged to wear a face mask in all inpatient areas and areas where consumers are receiving care (i.e. community appointments, home-visits, transporting people). Discretion may be applied in cases where masks impair your ability to communicate effectively.
  • Visitors must not eat or drink in multibed rooms because of the increased risk when multiple people remove their face mask in the same space.
  • Hand sanitiser is available and must be used.

Thank you in advance for your patience and understanding as our staff work hard to protect and care for some of the most vulnerable in our community.

Visiting patients with COVID-19

  • People can visit patients who have COVID-19 but they must wear an N95 mask – this will be provided if you don’t have one.
  • Other methods of communication will be facilitated e.g. phone, Facetime, Zoom, WhatsApp etc where visits aren’t possible.

All of our Hospitals

Visiting hours for our hospitals have returned to pre COVID-19 hours with the exception of Christchurch Women’s Hospital.

All visitors are recommended to wear a medical face mask.

Parents/caregivers are able to be with their child in hospital and visitors are now allowed, except for the Children’s Haematology and Oncology Day stay where just one parent/caregiver is able to attend their appointment with their child. Exceptions by special arrangement only.

Patients and visitors can also read the additional COVID-19 related visiting guidelines .

Literature Review

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Literature Review

2 documents.

Supporting the wellbeing of MIQ facility workers in Canterbury: Survey report and rapid literature review

Background

The Information Team at Community and Public Health (the public health division of the Canterbury District Health Board), was approached by the Canterbury Regional Isolation and Quarantine (C-RIQ) leadership who were concerned by incidents of stigma and discrimination being reported to them by staff working within the Canterbury Managed Isolation and Quarantine facilities (MIQF). In order to inform next steps by the C-RIQ leadership in supporting their workforce, a rapid literature review and a survey of Canterbury MIQF staff was undertaken in late 2020.

Literature Review

To date, little or no research has been applied to understanding any work-related wellbeing impacts for individual MIQF workers, their whānau, and their communities, as well as any implications for life outside-of-work. The most closely related literature is focused on healthcare and other front-line workers’ experiences within in-patient contexts, for other viral diseases such as HIV, EBOLA, MERS, SARS (although the COVID-19 literature is emerging).

In a high-stress situation, such as a pandemic response, distorted disease perception, misinformation, and fear can trigger reactions from individuals and groups that can disproportionately affect front-line workers (and their significant others) and lead to negative psychosocial outcomes. Stigma and discrimination directed towards front-line healthcare workers have been well documented across several previous viral epidemics including HIV, EBOLA, MERS, SARS, and currently COVID-19, where they have been shown to be strongly associated with low staff motivation, poor staff retention, low morale, reduced psychological wellbeing, and in some cases anxiety and depression.

The applicability of the literature review findings to COVID-19 MIQ facilities in New Zealand needs to be considered in light of the differences in illness severity and the nature of the settings studied in the literature. Despite these differences, previous epidemics and settings share many common elements, and many of the studies propose strategies that might be applied in the context of New Zealand’s MIQ facilities.

You can also read the MIQ facility workers survey summary

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More informationDownload pdf (1MB)

Wellbeing recovery after mass shootings: information for the response to the Christchurch mosque attacks 2019

On Friday 15 March 2019, two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, were attacked by one shooter. To date, 51 people have died from their injuries. Forty-five people were hospitalised on the day of the shooting, and 118 people were treated or admitted by Canterbury DHB in relation to the incident (as at 7 May 2019). 

A rapid literature review undertaken suggests that mass shootings are more intensely traumatic than other disasters, but that the majority of those affected by mass shootings will be resilient.

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More informationDownload pdf (1MB)

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Page last updated: 10 May 2021

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