Canberra Hospital cardiology department services wound back after staff stood down

Canberra Health Services chief executive Dave Peffer confirmed authorities had to hire locum doctors and some patients had to receive treatment in NSW.

Mr Peffer was asked about the situation in the cardiology department during a budget estimates hearing on Tuesday afternoon.

Opposition health spokeswoman Leanne Castley asked whether the cardiology department had all the necessary specialist and senior specialist staff to carry out the services of the cardiology departments.

"We did have a full suite of skills within the department to carry out a critical range of services," Mr Peffer said.

"Resulting from some of the actions and the processes that we commenced during that time, we did have an impact on our workforce and that did impact a number of the services that were previously available through our cardiology department.

"As a result of that, we worked with colleagues in NSW, which is not an unusual thing for us to do, we do that in a range of specialities in areas within the health service."

Mr Peffer said it did not affect a large number of patients in relation to procedures carried out and he took on notice a question regarding the exact number of patients.

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Estimates committee chair James Milligan asked whether there was any budgetary constraint around hiring specialist staff for the cardiology department with the appropriate skills.

"Some of the skills that we're talking about are specialist skills and they are not widely available and so to recruit individuals and to bring those skills in, the team needs to work through that," Mr Peffer said.

Mr Peffer said a number of locums had been engaged to help with the "disruption within the workforce". He said the service was looking to recruit for specialties both nationally and internationally.

Staff were stood down over allegations they had bullied colleagues for, in some cases, more than a decade.

An investigation found staff had reported that colleagues would swear, scream, kick doors and throw objects.

One of the stood-down staff members, Dr Muayad Alasady, is taking legal action against Canberra Health Services arguing his employer mishandled the allegations and breached various versions of the ACT Public Sector Medical Practitioners Enterprise Agreement.

He argued that his employer conducted preliminary assessments but did not inform him, and that the assessments determined the allegations against him could be resolved and did not require investigation.

Dr Alasady recently had a failed application to the Federal Court to stop further investigations and sanctions against him.

Mr Peffer was also asked in budget estimates about whether he had anticipated the outcome of a review into the cardiology department.

The Canberra Health Services chief executive reportedly told staff at a meeting on November 29 that the employment of some cardiologists "may and likely be terminated". He also announced former Fair Work commissioner Barbara Deegan would be undertaking a review into the department.

This information was outlined in a letter to Mr Peffer from the Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation, which had been released under freedom of information.

"That statement, if correct, anticipates the outcome of the Deegan review and raises real questions about the objectivity of the brief provided for that review and the intentions of the executive in undertaking the review," the letter said.

Ms Castley asked Mr Peffer to respond to this. He said prior surveys and reports had already highlighted concerns around the workforce and its culture.

Mr Peffer said the review from Ms Deegan was to enable decisions around whether to pursue individual investigations.

"Our intention through these processes is to bring a level of objectivity, which is why we're actually engaging people like Ms Deegan or law firms ... so that they're not done in house so that we avoid any sense of a predetermined outcome or objectivity not being present as part of that investigation," he said.

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