Big drop in doctors, rise in clerks

TASMANIAN hospitals are down by 120 doctors and 65 nurses but the number of clerks and administrators has gone up by 15, says health analyst Martyn Goddard.

Using Australian Institute of Health and Welfare statistics in the 12 months before and after extensive budget cuts, Mr Goddard said the health system’s ability to deliver basic services has declined to place Tasmania second worst in the country, behind Canberra.

‘‘This is the first comprehensive look at two years of data, before budget cuts and the year after them,’’ he said.

Health Minister Michelle O’Byrne said Mr Goddard’s argument was based on super- seded data and ignored recent elective surgery expenditure.

‘‘The number of doctors and nurses . . . is actually increasing,’’ Ms O’Byrne said.

Mr Goddard said it appeared a lot of doctors were employed but they were only working one day a week, and nursing numbers were falsely boosted by the large amount of overtime they worked.

Tasmania was the worst on the main measure of a healthy hospital system – the number of services for overnight patients – which fell further behind in the period after the cuts, he said.

The number of overnight services per 1000 population fell in Tasmania from 92.2 to 89.7, while it rose nationally from 112 to 116.2.