ACT Health refuses to release portions of review due to fears it could be 'detrimental'

Documents, released under freedom of information, show there was a review undertaken into the digital solutions division of ACT Health late last year, following the implementation of the territory's digital health record.

This review was prompted by "indicators from earlier surveys" and workforce data, however, these indicators had been redacted.

Opposition health spokeswoman Leanne Castley, who requested the documents, has asked the ACT Ombudsman to review the decision from ACT Health.

Authorities said, in a decision on access, there were concerns for staff welfare in releasing this information but it also showed they were concerned the information could negatively affect the wider directorate.

"The concern for staff welfare is paramount in [ACT Health's] consideration and must take measures to protect staff from experiencing stress and anxiety in anticipating uncertainty in this circumstance," the decision said.

"The disclosure of this information would be detrimental to the area and could be reasonably expected to negatively impact on the wider directorate."

The decision also said releasing information could reduce future engagement in staff surveys and there were concerns about staff confidentiality. The survey responses were anonymous.

But ACT Health shared a summary of findings to The Canberra Times on Tuesday afternoon. This showed challenges including that staff felt unsafe in expressing concerns, high workloads and limited resources had contributed to burnout and transparency around staff entitlements was inconsistently applied.

The summary showed only 25 per cent of staff in the division had responded to the survey. Positive findings included that 79 per cent of respondents said ACT Health was a good place to work and 87 per cent said their team supported a positive workplace culture.

The unredacted parts, released under freedom of information, were largely positive. There is a section on "identified strengths" which only has one sentence blanked out.

But the following section "specific areas of concerns" is mostly redacted despite being much longer than the section on "identified strengths".

The "findings of fact" section is almost completely blanked out except for one point which said: "Staff consistently cited their commitment to the work, to improving public health and to their teams; with senior staff... having a much higher response rate and being more likely to be positive".

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Ms Castley said the heavily redacted review only added to the perception of there being a lack of transparency within the territory's public health system.

"Releasing only positive commentary and not the negative erodes confidence and potentially decreases future participation in the survey because staff could feel their feedback had been disregarded," she said.

"We know this Labor-Greens government is anything but transparent when it comes to the many failures of the ACT health system and this heavily redacted FOI request reinforces that perception."

The documents also appears to be at odds with other freedom of information requests where negative information has been released in relation to reviews.

A previous request, published on the log earlier this year, show a summary of review findings into culture in the intensive care unit and cardiology department at Canberra Hospital.

The findings, from departments under Canberra Health Services, were provided to Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith in a ministerial briefing and the documents were released in full.

It showed a review of the intensive care unit found there were concerns about patient safety, a toxic work environment, favouritism and racism and bullying within the department.

The document also included findings from a review into the cardiology department, which had similar findings. Not only were the findings published in full but it included a breakdown of staff in the department and specifically referenced that four cardiologists were suspended.

The cardiology department has fewer staff than the digital services division of ACT Health. There are 99 staff in the department compared to 388 staff in the digital services division.

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