Elderly care COVID-19 vaccination is delayed due to untrained doctors providing the wrong dose

Healthcare Australia, which hired a doctor, could lose the contract in the event of further problems, and the Ministry of Health is reconfirming whether all contracted healthcare professionals have completed vaccine training.

“The HCA advised that the doctor was not involved in vaccination at other institutions and this is his only COVID-19 vaccine shift,” the Ministry of Health said in a statement.

“This department has independently verified and sought urgent evidence that all other HCA immune devices have completed all necessary training. The department has sought the termination of the contract by the company in the event of further breaches. Or notified that you may face other sanctions.

“The department will refer the doctor in question to the appropriate regulator.”

Professor Michael Kidd, Federal Deputy Chief Medical Officer, who was told by Healthcare Australia that his doctor had provided all the necessary training, is currently investigating the case. Hunt was hoping for a report from Healthcare Australia later Wednesday.

“The doctors involved did the wrong thing. It’s a case of human error, and it’s an unacceptable case of human error,” the Minister of Health said Wednesday afternoon.

“I asked the department to take action against the company and the doctors because of the obvious violations in both respects.”

Healthcare Australia did not answer the question as to whether the doctor was aware that he had not completed his training when he got a job.

Professor Allenchen, Deputy Chief Health Officer of Victoria and Co-Chair of the Australian Immunization Technology Advisory Group, said healthcare providers need to operate according to hospital standards in light of Wednesday’s revelation. ..

“There is a system to catch this kind of error. Hospitals have a reconfirmation procedure, but in this case, I think we need to review it again to prevent it from happening again,” he told ABC. 7.30 Wednesday program.

Professor Chen said the incident was the result of human and system errors, from which governments and contract providers need to learn.

According to Professor Chen, the two elderly caregivers are unlikely to have adverse reactions to overdose.

Pfizer’s vaccine vials contain six doses, and prior to the launch of the vaccine, Professor Brendan Murphy of the Ministry of Public Health expressed concern about multiple dose vials. Showed the risk of wasting vaccines..

“No one in Australia currently vaccinated has experience with multiple dose vials,” Murphy told Parliamentary Commission in early February.

Opposition health spokesman Mark Butler said Australians have the right to expect all vaccine providers to complete their training.

“I don’t know which uninhabited island you are on without knowing that these Pfizer vaccines are offered in multi-dose vials,” he said.

“A casual observer of this discussion over the past few weeks would have known what we knew because we had no experience with multiple dose vials in Australia.”

In the first week of Phase 1a of vaccine deployment, 30,000 doses of Pfizer were to be distributed to 190 towns by private healthcare providers to immunize 240 households. Healthcare Australia provides vaccination services to geriatric care facilities in New South Wales and Queensland, while Aspen Medical does the same in Victoria, Western Australia, Tasmania, South Australia, and ACT. going.

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Healthcare Australia said it would not end vaccinations for residents of facilities in New South Wales and Queensland, which were scheduled to take place by Friday.

“We don’t meet that list, but we aim to make up for it,” said a spokesman.

Last week, Hunt and Professor Murphy were convinced that 183,000 elderly caregivers in 2,600 households would be vaccinated within six weeks.

“It’s okay to take four to five weeks to vaccinate all elderly caregivers,” says Professor Murphy. I said at that time.

On Wednesday morning, Mr Hunt said the rollout has been on track.

“I’m really very happy with how this is going,” he said.

However, elderly care providers said the deployment was not yet on schedule.

Shane Nieves, CEO of The Peninsula Village, said staff at the Central Coast facility worked hard over the weekend to prepare the first day of vaccination for 300 residents. It was scheduled to start at 8am on Tuesday, but was canceled at the last minute.

“The inhabitants are very disappointed,” he said.

Baptist Care Bangor residents in Sydney were vaccinated on Wednesday, and a facility in Point Clare, Central Coast, New South Wales, was scheduled for Thursday, a spokeswoman said. However, the operator has not received information about the remaining centers, including the Wagga Wagga center in the federal government. List of places to be vaccinated this week..

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Other large elderly care providers with facilities in the listed locations have not received information about when vaccination will take place, or are their doses weeks or months away? I wasn’t informed.

A Healthcare Australia spokesman said the complexity of deployment meant that “flexibility” was needed and the company was still looking for vaccination nurses.

“We are improving the efficiency of our programs based on what we are learning about the time it takes to do things,” he said.

Butler wondered how the government would vaccinate residents of more than 200 facilities by the end of the week.

“Almost 90% of elderly housings that were supposed to be vaccinated this week are unvaccinated and we are in the middle of the week,” he said.

A Federal Ministry of Health spokesman said data on the number of vaccinated elderly care residents are being collected and will be provided to states and territories along with vaccination plans for the coming weeks.

With Rachel Dexter