Hutt Valley DHB leaders learned about the earthquake-prone hospital building in March

Top executives at the Hot Valley District Health Board learned two months ago that a seismic report found that the hospital’s main building met only 15% of the new building standard.

While the public and most employees were told the Hiritunga building was vulnerable to earthquakes on Tuesday, Chief Financial Officer Matthew Barr said he first learned of the report on March 8.

Leaders wanted more advice from engineers about the latest draft assessment of the building — home to a quarter of hospital beds in the area — before it was shared more widely, he said. Those with seismic rates below 34% are considered earthquake prone.

Barr said it was the first seismic report since the new standards went into effect in 2017, with the most recent report on the building in 2011.

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“It is fair to say that the report came as a surprise to us and we took it very seriously. We immediately requested additional engineering advice.”

Barr said the report was communicated to the New Zealand Department of Health and the New Zealand Ministry of Health in early April.

Peer review was still about two weeks away, but DHB was now confident that the final rating would still be below 30%.

Moving the building’s outpatient unit, maternity and postpartum services, radiology, burn unit, pediatric ward, general surgery and gynecology and medical ward would have “enormous impacts” on winter planning across the Lower North Island, Chief Medical Officer John Tate said.

“It will be an issue of the health of Haute, the capital, the coast and the rest of the central region, in terms of how to do that in the short term,” he said.

Rosa Woods/Staff

The Heretaunga building, right, contains approximately 80% of Hutt Hospital beds and a quarter of all Wellington inpatient beds.

Barr said the building would require “very significant work” to bring it up to code level, but that it was too early to say how much that would cost, or whether it would cost more than building a new hospital.

The classification means the building is considered “high risk” and will need to be listed on the national registry.

Legally, building owners have seven and a half years to complete the seismic reinforcement as soon as an official notice is issued. That hasn’t happened yet, Barr said.

John Tate said that while the board voted last Friday to move services as soon as possible, there is currently nowhere to go.

RNZ

There was a shocking announcement that the main building of Hutt Hospital was an earthquake hazard and should be closed.

“There is an inherent balance here between the health and safety of our patients and staff, but at the same time, we also have a clear commitment to providing health care to the Hut Valley, including the ability to access health care.”

Tate said the goal was to get patients out within 12 months, but as soon as possible if possible.

“We have 201 beds, how are we going to find them? How are we going to use the private sector? Can we use the aged care facilities?”

“Three months ago, there were no concerns about the hospital.”

Whatever happens, Tate said, Hutt Valley will continue to have its own hospital.

However, the call about whether work should be done to bring the hospital back to code, or tear down the building and start over, will be made by Incoming Health New Zealand, which is replacing DHBs within six weeks.

Health Minister Andrew Little said on Tuesday the government was “committed to providing hospital services in the Haut Valley”.

Tate said the board was looking at replacing the 40-year-old Hiritonga building in about 12 years.

Hutt Valley DHB CEO Vyunagh Dogan was not in front of the media about the report.

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