Ms ROSOL – Minister, I’d like to ask a few more questions about the reportable deaths review. There’s been a suggestion made that in addition to his own direct misconduct, Dr Renshaw also intimidated or ordered others to falsify records and suppress matters from the coroner. Are you looking at any historic cases that don’t involve Dr Renshaw, recognising what was said earlier about some of the case selection being randomised? Will there be any review of cases that don’t involve Dr Renshaw?
Mr WEBSTER – It is indicated in the final report of the panel. They looked at some of the cases that would fit the category you just described. Yes, we’ll look at other cases if anyone wishes to identify them. Earlier, I talked about going back to 1989. It has been pointed out to me that because of disposal schedules, the period we can go back to is 2003.
Ms ROSOL – Thank you for clarifying that. One of the things that’s remarkable about the situation is how many times it happened. Staff we’ve talked to say that they raised concerns, but they never went anywhere. It doesn’t seem like the review panel examined whether complaints had been made or how they were handled. Is that something that the department has done?
Mr BARNETT – I’ll pass that question to the acting secretary.
Mr WEBSTER – The panel looked at whether we have corrected our processes. Importantly, we don’t want the process that seemed to have been in place in the past to continue into the future. They gave us some assurance that it wasn’t systemic, as in it wasn’t multiple senior doctors across our system doing this. They gave us reassurance that our new processes were on the mark. We’ve taken the decision to give the public further confidence by having this audit process in place. As I said yesterday in the other place, if this has been a culture issue, we need to make sure that we’re checking on the culture into the future, not just assuming that we fixed it at one point in time.
Ms ROSOL – In recent years there have been multiple cases where a death that’s occurred at the LGH has been referred to the coroner by another body, such as the health complaints commissioner. This fact was noted by the coroner in their findings. In one report in 2021, the coroner said:
I do not consider that the patient’s death was due to, as the medical certificate of death indicated, a pulmonary embolism, nor, as a post-mortem report suggested, cardiac‑related. The cause of the patient’s death was sepsis.
When the department reviewed these coroner’s reports and saw that the LGH had failed to appropriately report a death and that death certificates were incorrect, was anything done to investigate the issue?
Mr WEBSTER – I would have to look back and find out. I wasn’t in the position at that time, so I’m not able to answer off top of my head. I will seek an answer for you.
Ms ROSOL – Is that something that we could take on notice, please?
Mr BARNETT – Yes, put it on notice, through you, Chair. We’re more than happy to respond.
