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

Cantabs welcome fresh air at outdoor venues

Friday 2 June 2017Media release3 minutes to read

The results are in and they show Cantabrians are excited about smokefree venues. Even better, people are actively choosing to support venues that have smokefree outdoor dining areas.

These are part of the findings from the Fresh Air project, a collaboration between the Cancer Society and Canterbury District Health Board, who with the support of the Christchurch City Council, ran a summer trial to stub out smoking in the outdoor areas in a number of cafes and restaurants in the city.

During the six month project, 20 venues were invited to make their outdoor dining areas smokefree. Eighteen took up the challenge and became totally smokefree hospitality venues.

Former manager of the Ilex café in the Botanical Gardens, Liz Parlane says they had a really positive reaction to the project trial. “It gave us permission to say we're smokefree and reinforce that the whole park is a smokefree area.” Current manager Amy Stones says it was a useful way to raise awareness among tourists of the city's no smoking areas.

Tania Hughes owns Savoir in Merivale and says the transition to no smoking outdoors went really smoothly. “It's all been positive, and I've had really good feedback from my customers.”

Liz Chesterman, chief executive of the Cancer Society Canterbury and West Coast division says the Cancer Society was heartened by the positive response to the summer trial. “The results of this project show that New Zealand's goal of being smokefree by 2025 is achievable. We believe this is the beginning of a groundswell towards smokefree communities everywhere.”

Manager of the Communities team at Community and Public Health Kerry Marshall, praised the partnerships with the Cancer Society, Canterbury DHB, Community and Public Health, City Council and all the business owners that made the project work. She also congratulated the cafes on having the courage to try something different.

“These business owners have been willing to take part in something innovative. I commend them for being brave and stepping out of their comfort zone.”

In its response, Councillor Glenn Livingstone said on behalf of the Christchurch City Council that it was taking its mandate as a clean, green city seriously and literally.

“We hope more venues see this as a positive move. It's not only proved itself good for the community, but also good for business.”

Emily Box of the Cancer Society says half of the pilot venues reported they had customers visiting specifically because they had smokefree outdoor areas.

Other results showed that out of the 18 venues…

  • 4 reported an increase in customer numbers
  • 12 reported a decrease in the number of complaints about others smoking
  • 14 recorded more positive customer comments
  • 3 said more people were using the outdoor area.

With smoking still the leading cause of preventable death in New Zealand, Emily says the results show there is an appetite among Kiwis to embrace a smokefree environment. “The next step for the Fresh Air project is to share our results, and encourage more venues to join the Fresh Air movement, and help move New Zealand closer to its Smokefree 2025 goal.”

Find out more about The Fresh Air Project.

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Page last updated: 3 October 2018

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