The Office of the Health Ombudsman (OHO) continued to receive a high number of complaints and notifications in July, as it started its second year as Queensland’s health service complaints agency.

Along with complaint numbers remaining high, mandatory notifications continued to increase, making up 15 per cent of all complaints received.

All health practitioners, employers and education providers must notify the Health Ombudsman if they believe a registered health practitioner, or student, has demonstrated conduct that places the public at substantial risk of harm. This is known as a mandatory notification.

“Mandatory notifications relate to very serious matters and July’s data indicates that the reporting system is continuing to work as intended,” said Mr Atkinson-MacEwen.

“Without practitioners, employers and education providers notifying me of serious matters, I cannot act where necessary to minimise risks to the health and safety of the public.

“I am pleased to see that all those concerned recognise that this is not a punitive measure, but rather one that protects the public and allows health conduct or performance issues faced by practitioners to be addressed,” he said.

July figures also show an increase in the number of local resolutions (127) and conciliations (13) started.

Health Ombudsman Leon Atkinson-MacEwen said the OHO has implemented operational changes to improve the complaints process for all involved.

“We have been continually reviewing our procedures in order to deliver better performance outcomes across all areas of the organisation.

“A result of this work has been the development of a streamlined process to identify matters for local resolution and conciliation, two very important and useful ways for us to assist people in resolving complaints,” said Mr Atkinson-MacEwen.

For more information, or to view the July performance report in full, visit www.oho.qld.gov.au.

Media contact:

media@oho.qld.gov.au 0427 483 656