MDHB Financial Recovery Progress

04/06/2010 | MDHB Financial Recovery Progress

MidCentral District Health Board’s Financial Recovery Programme is proving to be very successful with a number of savings being made over a wide range of services.

By the end of June MDHB will have achieved around $3 million of savings towards their goal to breakeven. This is a great achievement in its own right and will mean that the deficit for the full year will be about $10 million – still some way to go, but good progress nevertheless.

MDHB is responsible for overseeing the delivery of many healthcare services in the community. The Financial Recovery Programme is not about stopping these services. MDHB strongly wish to continue providing the services they have worked hard to establish. However this may mean providing services in an alternative way or by someone else.

CEO, Murray Georgel, said we understand the importance of having specialist services provided locally and want to do this to the best of our ability. Providing duplication of specialist services is however a luxury in our current economic climate and we must continue only with what we can afford.

“We are working hard to maintain and improve elective and acute services while still living within our means. It is important to understand that a change in how a service works doesn’t mean the service is going to disappear. It will still be provided but in a more efficient way, such as utilising primary care capacity.”

“We recognise that as an individual or a service that is being directly affected, change is difficult. However the Financial Recovery Programme needs to be implemented within the wider perspective of a DHB and we must look at how to achieve the most effective outcomes for the organisation as a whole. MDHB needs to alter a number of our services in order to keep all of our services.”

“These are challenging times for the organisation but patience and dedication from staff is seeing MDHB make improvements and work towards achieving our goals.”

Contact: Communications Unit (06) 350-8945