Rachel Stephen-Smith says damning review of obstetrics and gynaecology confirmed 'existing challenges'

This is despite a damning draft review finding the department at the Centenary Hospital for Women and Children failed to meet five of six standards needed for training accreditation.

The review found the unit suffers from high workloads, "chronic understaffing" and high levels of burnout while trainees reported being spoken to in a "disrespectful manner" and being given feedback in "inappropriate settings".

Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith said the review, by the Royal Australian New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, confirmed known challenges faced by the department.

"We know we have a job of work to do, we're certainly not shying away from that," she said.

"But we also know what we have to do and the college's feedback is very helpful in that regard in that it confirms some of the things that we understood were existing challenges and it gives us opportunities to move forward with the college to address some of those challenges.

"I really want to reassure women and families who are looking to birth at Canberra Hospital that they will get the care they need and deserve."

However, the college's review said the hospital had "repeatedly" been made aware of issues where the training was insufficient.

Ms Stephen-Smith said the college was committed to working with the hospital to ensure training accreditation was maintained. The hospital has been given provisional accreditation for six months. The Health Minister also said she did not believe the training accreditation was at risk.

"The college has been really clear that they are committed to working with Canberra Health Services to ensure that training accreditation is maintained at the Centenary Hospital for Women and Children," she said.

"I have no expectation that our training accreditation is at risk. Clearly the college has concerns and it's expressed those concerns."

Ms Stephen-Smith dismissed a review of the hospital's executive, despite the report finding a "clear divide" between frontline medical staff and hospital executive.

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The report found top-down communication was poor and "extreme escalation" was needed to achieve any engagement at an executive level.

The Health Minister said Canberra Health Services chief executive Dave Peffer was meeting with staff to hear their concerns.

"I don't think it's about a review of the executive. I think it's about hearing those voices of frontline staff," Ms Stephen-Smith said.

Opposition Leader Elizabeth Lee would not be drawn on whether she felt a review of executives was needed, instead, she said there needed to be greater ministerial responsibility.

"The fact is that there is a huge disconnect between what is happening on the frontline, and what is happening in terms of the lack of ministerial responsibility and leadership that we see," she said.

"There is no doubt that the executive level at the Canberra Health Service has been pulled in all different directions because of a lack of leadership from this sort of stuff.

"They need to be looking at addressing some of the absolute critical issues in health and returning to services is at the core of that."

Ms Lee expressed grave concern at the report.

"It is incredibly concerning if the college doesn't believe and doesn't trust the ACT health system with its training then ACT mothers can't trust the system," she said.

Ms Stephen-Smith said the college had expressed to her these were issues being faced around the country but she also said Canberra Health Services needed to do more to support staff following a traumatic event.

"Obstetricians and gynaecologists are part of bringing new life into the world and experiencing that joy with family but we also know that there are times when things go wrong or when birth trauma is experienced. And that's not only experienced by the woman that's also experienced by the team around that woman," she said.

"And we know we have to do more to support people when those things do happen. That's part of what contributes to burnout when people feel that they're not being appropriately supported, when something does go wrong."

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