Dave Macpherson: Dodgy Doctor claims health has passed annual ‘check-up’
While I was walking 4 kms around Hamilton Lake on Saturday, in the company of 500 other citizens aiming to draw attention to the high and worsening rates of suicide in New Zealand, a press release from Health Minister ‘Dr’ Jonathan Coleman arrived in my in-box.
The release claimed ‘Health passes its annual check up’, and stated that everything was hunky dory, looking at all the key measuring yardsticks.
Given we are facing a mental health crisis, acknowledged by almost everyone bar the aforesaid ‘doctor’, and given that I was marching in the company of 500 people who were concerned about record high levels of suicide, among the very worst in the world, my thoughts immediately turned to the ‘dodgy doctor’ with false papers that Waikato DHB had employed as a psychiatrist for many months (Mohamed Siddiqui) – maybe he had got loose in the Minister’s office and was sending out false releases to match his false practising certificate?
On checking however, it seems that dodgy doc Mohamed Siddiqui has got himself a soulmate in dodgy doc Jonathan Coleman. They are both working overtime to hide the truth from their employers – in Coleman’s case, the taxpayers of New Zealand.
Without going too much into the huge health deficits across the community, such as the tens of thousands of families that cannot afford to take their kids to the real doctor, but instead overwhelm the various Hospital Emergency Departments when things get too bad, it seems that the Minister’s press release on the laughingly-named ‘Health and Independence Report’ is little more than a piece of election year spin, and is anything but independent.
I went online on the Ministry website to check out what the report said about mental health, thinking that – if the often-touted figures of one in five people experiencing some sort of mental illness at some stage – there would be some sort of focus on this. Well, it got its first mention on Page 43 (out of 61), and did mention some statistical issues, but implied everything was well in hand with various programmes – such as the Well Child/Tamariki Ora programme for young school-age kids and pre-schoolers.
What the report conveniently didn’t mention was that only 11 out of 68 high schools in a recent survey had health programmes in place to work with their students’ growing mental health issues; that nearly half of all kids under the age of 11 needing mental health assessments (47,000) were unable to get appointments within 3 weeks; that parents and families all over the country are at their wits end trying to cope with children and other family members showing signs of mental ill-health. The report did mention suicide, but strangely the 2013 figures it produced were more than three years out of date, missing the record levels in the last 3 years.
If my own health check-up received such a glowing report, that was so out of whack with reality, I’d be reporting my doctor to the Health & Disability Commissioner. Of course, you may have to wait 5-6 years for the case to be heard.
Dave Macpherson is TDB’s mental health blogger. He became a Waikato DHB member after his son died from mental health incompetence.
Agree with all you say Dave…and respect to you for your persistence.
Regarding Jonathon Coleman (I am loath to call him “Doctor”), has anyone else noticed that he appears to be suffering from some kind of speech problem at the moment?
Back in the day, when all male National MPs aspired to sound as much like their previous Leader as humanly possible, the Miser of Health was virtually audibly indistinguishable from Key.
Now he sounds like….well…someone who is trying to decide upon what persona to adopt.
Perhaps when he has sorted out his personality crisis he may wish to address the crisis that is Health.
The guy isn’t a Doctor’s A hole, he is a puppet for the multinational pharmaceutical companies and the multinational food conglomerates, he does not understand the inter relationship between good nutrition and mental health.
Studies done in the USA prisons in the 1950’s showed improved behaviour of inmates who had good diets and who were given high dosages of vitamin B, I personally believe a lot of societies problems today are now caused by poor diet which increases mental health problems in society, people today in NZ can not afford to feed themselves properly and surviving on junk food supplied by the multinationals and the NZ supermarkets ?
The guy isn’t a Doctor’s A hole, he is a puppet for the multinational pharmaceutical companies and the multinational food conglomerates, he does not understand the inter relationship between good nutrition and mental health.
Studies done in the USA prisons in the 1950’s showed improved behaviour of inmates who had good diets and who were given high dosages of vitamin B, I personally believe a lot of societies problems today are now caused by poor diet which increases mental health problems in society, people today in NZ can not afford to feed themselves properly and surviving on junk food supplied by the multinationals and the NZ supermarkets ?
I found out years ago Dr Karmenica is top consultant on Mental health to government. He’s a psychiatrist who left Serbia after their bloody war – did anybody look at this man’s history – was he associated with Radovan Karadzic a war criminal now in the Hague.
If they’ve got people from cultures like Serbia deciding on mental health services & who gets committed and forcibly drugged then that will be a big part of the problem. We all know what is happening in mental health isn’t the Kiwi way. Why are our politicians so different to us citizens – aren’t they supposed to represent us?
Still think you need to look at the legalities of what is happening in mental health – I’ve been doing this a lot longer than Dave & because I havn’t been able (or got the services to help me) to return to work I have made this issue my job. I’m alive and suicidal because I am refused care I am entitled to – I can take a case, a dead person can’t.
Come on, Dave, it is all in your mind, you seem to believe in “illness belief”:
http://www.gla.ac.uk/media/media_210440_en.pdf
Everything is hunky dory, or should be, once mentally ill get a job and toughen up.
He, Aylward, was one of the senior advisors WINZ and MSD relied on when preparing and launching their welfare reforms, for sick and disabled on benefits (oh those lazy ones).
https://www.beehive.govt.nz/speech/speech-medical-professionals
“It also echoes the UK’s assessment processes and the “Pathways to Work” initiative for vocational rehabilitation designed by Professor Sir Mansel Aylward.
When I sat down with Sir Mansel earlier this year he told me that health conditions account for just 10 to 15 per cent of barriers to work for people on disability benefits.
He said that many health conditions or disabilities can be well managed in work but addressing other barriers are just as important.
So, under the new system we will look at all of the barriers to people finding or keeping work. Detailed medical evidence will also be gathered.”
So toughen up, the government offers the solutions, in better public service, and targeted “support” for those mentally ill that have it only in their heads, toughen up, perhaps?!
Dr Colman is in LA LA land if he thinks health services are adequately given.
Ask any kid or elder as they are always the most in need the ststa say and when you look at the aged in NZ they are the most affected by rising dental costs so their teeth rot and they get blood poisoning because many (according to the dental ass’n) & Dentist’s, most now cannot afford the rising dental repairs now that Nactional five years ago removed elder emergency dental care subsidies!!!!!!!!.
These elders are dying because of this and others are costing other health providers extras costs because of blood poisoning from rotting teeth decay and gum diseases.
The breakdown of our Mental Health system started in the 1980’s under Harold Titter, why do you dismantle a health system which was functioning quite well, sure it wasn’t perfect but a lot of these people had mental health problems and didn’t have the necessary skills to function properly in society. Weird and spooky if you ask me ?
STOP PRESS!!!!
“Govt embarks on five-year plan to improve mental health services”
http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/political/330103/govt-embarks-on-five-year-plan-to-improve-mental-health-services
(Hey, “Doc”, if as you say it ain’t broke, why try to fix it?)
Perhaps himself read your post Dave….though I doubt $7.5 million will do the job…
More money in mental health care means nothing if the money is being used to prop up the salaries of medical elites, and you can guarantee that’s where National’s “targetted” funding will go.
The system does not recognise human-beings as experiencing legitimate difficulties, but rather seeks to abduct them into maximum “security” mental health torture wards, or medicate their pain away using profit-generating pills. There is no room, interest, or initiative by the government to thoroughly invest in holistic social support and recovery approaches, which, in all honesty, are the best medicine. The government’s “moving away from institutionalised care to community oriented care” is political language for pushing people onto the streets. Where is the community “oriented care” funding going? Where are these “community oriented” solutions? The ones I know of are entirely run by volunteers, are desperate for support, and receive no money from BigGov. The ones I know of that DO receive money from BigGov are commercial enterprises designed for profit, and have the power to schmooze politicians for big contracts. These ones are run by the most sociopathic business people you can imagine or offshore enterprises. The medical industry in New Zealand is in many cases, extremely, extremely corrupt. The medical and business elites use the veneer of medicine to portray themselves as sage-like, and receive political immunity and big bonuses in return.
Unfortunately we are going to have to rebuild a Mental Health System as the current one is broken. We did have a functioning Mental Health System however neoliberalism dismantled it under Harold Titter, the problem is mental health is complex and requires support from the State as people in society do not have the resources to fund it and it is a difficult area for the private sector unless they can get big funding from Central Government. The Government in NZ has appeared to have disowned Mental Health as it is not fashionable, better backing the Clinton Foundation and Saudi Agricultural Hubs ?
Unfortunately we are going to have to rebuild a Mental Health System as the current one is broken. We did have a functioning Mental Health System however neoliberalism dismantled it under Harold Titter, the problem is Mental Health is complex area and not readily understood by many in the Medical Area, it requires support from the State as people in society do not have the resources to fund it and it is a difficult area for the private sector unless they can get big funding from Central Government. The Government in NZ has appeared to have disowned Mental Health as it is not fashionable, better backing the Clinton Foundation and Saudi Agricultural Hubs ?
Voters, left and right or centre, simply do NOT care much about mental health, unless it affects themselves, that is the damned truth, and so they will continue ignore this issue, as long nothing more serious, as they deem, affects them individually.
We are talking about self serving and crap people, really, like humanity in general, does also not give much of a shit about climate change and pollution.