An audience with the Minister of Health

Survivors, family members, PCFNZ service users and others came together last evening for an audience with the Minister of Health the Hon Simeon Brown, and Minister for the Community and Voluntary Sector, Minister for Disability Issues, Minister for Social Development and Employment, the Hon Louise Upston at the Cambridge Primary School hall. Also in attendance were Dr Shiva Nair, Head of Urology at Waikato Hospital, the Chief Executive of Prostate Cancer Foundation NZ, Peter Dickens, PCFNZ Support Network Manager Raewyn Paviour, and Cambridge PCFNZ Support Group Coordinator Ron Greenwood.

The Minister spent around an hour speaking to and conversing with the audience. In his address he noted the representations PCFNZ has made to him and to government requesting that urgent consideration be given to pilots of prostate cancer screening. He acknowledged the crucial importance of early detection and said that he had instructed his officials to report to him on how pilots could be implemented on the ground. He noted that doing nothing is not an attractive option to him, particularly as efforts in this area are clearly now being made in multiple countries overseas.

On treatments, he said he was aware of the need for New Zealand to follow comparable countries overseas that have made robot assisted procedures the standard in their health systems for the surgical treatment of prostate cancer. He noted the follow-on impact of this in keeping top urological talent practising here in NZ rather than pursuing careers abroad. He said he was in the middle of a work program with Health NZ and officials to accelerate the availability of robot assisted surgical options for prostate cancer patients going through the public system in New Zealand.

He also spoke about how crucial the role of MRI is in the diagnosis and management of prostate cancer and that he is aware of problems in MRI availability nationally. He said that the country is in the process of upgrading and replacing much of our older and superseded equipment with modern machines, and that he was also working on ensuring we have the personnel to operate this upgraded stock such that they are available to those going through the prostate cancer diagnostic pathway.

The Minister spoke about medicines and acknowledged that while progress has been made, particularly in cancer, on the availability of modern medicines in the current term of the government, there is much left to do. He said that while Pharmac had challenges to meet in transforming itself to an organisation that is far more patient-centric that it has been historically, he was also looking to place a priority on the funding of medicines that will be able to maximise our health dollar by improving outcomes in terms reducing the impact on the rest of the health system, such as on our hospitals and also to the country in terms of lost productivity.   

In paying tribute to the PCFNZ volunteers on the ground for all of their work in providing support to those affected by prostate cancer in the area, the Minister said he recognised that everyone affected by cancer will have their own story, and that ultimately while it is his and the government’s responsibility to make decisions on the nation’s health where 1 in every 5 of tax payers dollars are spent, and which with our aging and increasing population is likely to rise, it is for those present in the room and the public to judge whether he and the government has succeeded.