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

Canterbury meets 5 out of 6 Health Targets

Tuesday 22 August 2017Media release2 minutes to read

THIS IS AN ARCHIVED PAGE. The advice and information contained in this page may not be current and it should only be used for historical reference purposes.

Canterbury DHB chief executive David Meates attributes Canterbury DHB's high achievement in the latest National Health targets, to the extraordinary people working in the local health system.

Today the final quarter four Health Target results were released and the Canterbury DHB is one of only three DHBs to achieve five out of the six health targets set by the Ministry of Health. None of the twenty new Zealand DHBs achieved all six of the targets. Health targets are a set of national performance measures specifically designed to improve the performance of health services and they reflect significant public and government priorities and provide a focus for action.

The only target not achieved by Canterbury DHB was Shorter Stays in ED in June. The target is to have 95 percent of patients admitted, transferred and discharged from the emergency departments within six hours. Canterbury achieved 94.4 percent of the target. “Given the huge pressures that our health system has been under, including extremely busy general practice after-hour services and the highest emergency department presentation days in Canterbury's history, the focus on ensuring that patient flow has been maintained has been outstanding. Our health system is full of extraordinary people who turn up every day to do the very best for our community,” David Meates says.

Data show that across Canterbury, 80 percent of people who present to the Christchurch Hospital Emergency Department are admitted, transferred and discharged in under four hours. From April 2016 to March 2017, the average time spent in ED was 2.7 hours per person. This makes each ED attendance approximately 50 minutes shorter than the national benchmarked average. It also allows for 23,087 more patients to be assessed and treated in our ED using the same resources.

Canterbury DHB was ranked in the top four for delivering faster cancer treatment, increased immunisation and raising healthy kids. The other targets it achieved were for better help for smokers to quit and improved access to elective surgery.

“It's by asking questions that challenge the way we do things that ensures we keep making our health services more efficient, and better for our patients,” Meates added.

More information about the national health targets can be found here www.health.govt.nz/healthtargets.

ENDS

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Page last updated: 19 October 2022

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