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New Zealand: Group Gives Community a Sayon Health
Issues
By Nikki Macdonald, Marlborough Express
June 11, 2003
New Zealand - Elderly health will come under the spotlight later this
month as a new group brings together district health board, GPs and
community representatives to look at health issues. Project manager Jane Large said the move was a huge step forward for elderly health and would be the first time all the interested groups had got together to look at the bigger picture. With
growing numbers of elderly in the region, the health of older people was a
critical issue for Marlborough, Mrs Large said. The
new group is part of a national strategy to improve health access for the
elderly and will complement the district council's new elderly forum, set
up to look at other factors affecting quality of life, such as transport
and housing. Both
Marlborough and Nelson will have their own project management groups,
allowing local input and control. The
group aims to provide a link between community and hospital care to give a
better, more integrated service, Mrs Large said. "We
will be getting people at the coal face involved with helping remove the
barriers to accessing healthcare." Long
time health campaigner John Brett will be the older people's
representative on the group, while Alzheimer's Society worker Vivienne
Peters will be the community worker on the panel. Mrs
Peters was excited by the project, which she was confident would not be
"just another group of people wanting to do good". Mr
Brett, who often voices his opinions at district health board meetings,
was also hopeful that by sitting at the table with DHB representatives he
would be able to change their views. Top
of his priority list was finding out how many elderly were waiting for
cataract operations and improving that situation. The
project work will be funded through the older people strategy and also
through the devolution of disability funding, due to go through in
October. Devolution,
which will transfer funding from the Ministry of Health to individual
health boards, will give boards more flexibility to decide how and where
they spend their money, Mrs Large said. "One
of the biggest problems in our system at the moment is the funding is very
rigid. Services are difficult to access because the definitions are so
strict they are often excluding people who could benefit. "Devolution
will mean more flexibility on a local level." While she expected it take some time for the full benefits of the strategy to filter down, Mrs Large hoped to have completed one project within three months. Copyright
© 2002 Global Action on Aging
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