Nelson Hospital boss Lexie O’Shea has been seconded to a new role at Health New Zealand with a top health leader set to replace her.
It follows a series of stories by 1News where nine senior doctors at Nelson Hospital raised concerns about how patient safety was being impacted by low staffing levels, among other issues at the hospital.
It also comes after Health New Zealand’s boss for the South Island Martin Keogh stood down last month, choosing to return home to family in Australia.
Keogh’s replacement Pete Watson said today in a statement that Lexie O’Shea will be the executive adviser of planned care for the South Island from September 15.
“Improving the timeliness of care across our communities is one of our highest priorities. Lexie brings the experience, insight, and leadership needed to help us deliver better planned care services across the South Island”.
O’Shea was the chief executive of the Nelson Marlborough District Health Board and is now the group director of operations (GDO) for the region.
Jo Gibbs will become the interim director and will begin a handover period from early September.
Gibbs has worked in executive leadership roles in the UK and New Zealand. During Covid-19 she was the national director of the vaccine programme, for which she received an ONZM. She is currently an executive adviser at Health New Zealand.
“Health New Zealand welcomes Jo back to Te Waipounamu and thanks Lexie for stepping into this critical leadership role at a key time for planned care services,” Watson said in the statement.
Nelson Hospital has the longest wait times in the country for first specialist appointments.
Doctors interviewed by 1News painted a dire picture of the situation at Nelson Hospital. They said some patients were undergoing emergency surgery and having their cancers go from curable to incurable due to the long wait times.
1News sat down with O’Shea in June after months of requests to speak with her. She said at that time that “I did everything I could” to escalate the doctors concerns before they went public with them.
She declined to say at that time when or who she escalated these concerns to.
Last month a 25 page review by senior Health New Zealand clinicians uncovered “significant” staffing issues at Nelson Hospital, among plenty of other concerns. It also found the leadership structure is not fit for purpose.
However, no solutions were announced and Health New Zealand has a programme of work ongoing to address the issues.
