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 should also read the additional more detailed visiting guidelines for each specific hospital.

More COVID-19 information

Laboratories

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14 documents.

Transporting specimens

Official guidance documents we use in New Zealand to cover the handling and transportation of microbiology samples from provincial hospitals to centralized testing laboratories.

I expect that official guidance would cover aspects such as reported by Miller et al. [1] including transport media, temperature and time from specimen extraction from patient until the analysis is completed at the centralized laboratory. [1] Miller et al., A guide to utilization of the microbiology laboratory for diagnosis of infectious diseases 2018: Updated by the Infectious Diseases Society of America and the American Society of Microbiology. Current Infectious Diseases 2018, 67(6), e1-e94. doi: 10.1093/cid/ciy381.

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COVID-19 Rapid Antigen Tests

Brand of Rapid Antigen Tests distributed to the public for home testing at Whanau Ora COVID testing centre Pages Road.

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COVID-19 tests and identifying measles

Regarding COVID vaccinations: How do testing protocols uniquely and individually identify the subject as having one or more of the following if they test positive? 

  • Measles virus

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COVID-19 Tests January 2020 to January 2021

  • How many COVID-19 tests, taken in the CDHB region between 22 January 2020 and today's date 28 January 2021, have been spoiled or damaged?
  • Resulting in those samples not being able to be tested./How were the tests spoiled or damaged?
  • When and where the samples were taken and transported to?
  • What repercussions were there for those involved in the testing process, including the patients affected?
  • How many patients, whose tests were spoiled or damaged, subsequently tested positive for COVID-19?
  • Any and all copies of video and photographs of spoiled or damaged COVID-19 tests.

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SARS Cov-2 testing on mariners

Regarding the ‘new strain’ of the SARS CoV-2: Has any evidence of that viral strain been forensically checked for, on the 3 vessels involved and were any of the cargos transporting frozen foodstuffs, fluids, chemicals, or containing medical supplies?

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COVID-19 Testing used for Christchurch fishermen

The serology testing specifically used for the Christchurch fishermen

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COVID-19 Testing Protocols

  1. Copies of any protocols developed by, endorsed by or agreed to by Canterbury Health Laboratories  in relation to testing of samples from various patient groups within Canterbury.
  2. A summary of the mean and 90th centile time between sample collection and result reporting for covid-19 nucleic acid testing for samples analysed by Canterbury Health Laboratories. 

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Covid-19 testing

RT-PCR Tests for for COVID-19 in Canterbury.

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Letter of Understanding between the DHB and the PSA regarding an increase of penal rates

Please provide the Letter of Understanding between the DHB and the PSA regarding an increase of penal rates for PSA members, effective 13/4/2020. clarified as referring to all DHBs that employ laboratory workers.

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COVID-19 contact tracing

Number of people working in COVID-19 contact tracing each day from 1/12/2019 - 31/05/2020.

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Number of COVID-19 tests carried out

Information from Canterbury Health Laboratories and Community and Public Health about COVID-19 lab tests.

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Correspondence to unions regarding translation and abatement payments

DHB's correspondence to unions in regards to translation and abatement payments.

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Canterbury Health Laboratories submission on draft standard ASNZ 2243.3

Canterbury Health Laboratories submission in relation to Prions regarding the draft standard ASNZ 2243.3

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Cost of transporting specimens

Amount spent transporting specimens to and from Canterbury Health Laboratories CDHB.

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Page last updated: 28 April 2022

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