Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith has reassured Canberrans the recent tragic deaths of two children will be properly investigated, saying she thinks of their families "every single day".
The minister was responding to allegations aired on Monday night on A Current Affair around the deaths of Canberra children, five-year-old Rozalia Spadafora and 13-year-old Brian Lovelock.
Rozalia died on July 5 at the Canberra Hospital after going into cardiac arrest waiting to be transported to Sydney for specialist treatment. Brian died on August 12 in a Sydney hospital after he had suffered a cardiac arrest at the Canberra Hospital and was transported interstate for treatment. He died one week before his 14th birthday.
Rozalia was found to have suffered from the viral infection myocarditis. Brian, according to his mother, had COVID and was underweight due to a lifelong eating disorder.
Both deaths are being investigated by ACT Policing and the ACT Coroner.
Ms Stephen-Smith told The Canberra Times on Monday that neither family had been forgotten and their deaths would be properly investigated to prevent similar tragedies in the future.
"I literally think about these families every single day," she said.
"And I know that the hospital, and the leadership here, are very focused on ensuring that any lessons that we can possibly learn from these circumstances are learned. But there are appropriate investigation processes to go through to do that."
A Current Affair on Monday night aired an interview with Brian's mother Mel Clancy who said her son collapsed at home in the early hours of August 5 getting out of the shower. She told the program he was very underweight due to his eating disorder and had then contracted COVID.
Brian's mother Mel Clancy told A Current Affair that paramedics arrived at their house and then called for back-up, a nearby fire crew responding.
However one of the paramedics told her the fire crew would not come in the house "because of COVID" and they would have to wait for a second ambulance crew to arrive.
Brian's mother said her son was transported to the Canberra Hospital where he went into cardiac arrest. She was told his heart had stopped beating for 45 minutes as staff worked to revive him. Brian's heart was restarted, he was ventilated and his mother was told he would need to be taken to Sydney.
She said she had to sit by her dying son for 12 hours at the Canberra Hospital before he was flown to Sydney and that she was not allowed to accompany him.
"I wanted to be with him. It was torture," Ms Clancy told the program.
Brian never recovered. The 13-year-old passed away in a Sydney children's hospital on August 12. Brian was laid to rest at the Norwood Park Crematorium last Thursday.
Brian's death came five weeks after the death of five-year-old Rozalia Spadafora at the Canberra Hospital on July 5.
Her mother Katrina Spadafora told A Current Affair on Monday night that she was told twice by staff at the hospital to take her daughter home from emergency even as the condition of her child worsened and she was "lifeless, white, pale".
A decision was made to transport the five-year-old to Sydney but Rozalia died from cardiac arrest before this could happen. She had been suffering from myocarditis.
Mrs Spadafora, on the program, pleaded with the hospital to not dismiss the concerns of parents about their children's health.
"Please take mothers seriously when we come in with our children," she said.
Australian Medical Association ACT president Professor Walter Abhayaratna also told A Current Affair that the ACT needed to follow the lead of NSW and Victoria and implement a better system of monitoring sick children who presented to the Canberra Hospital.
"More frequent monitoring of the patient, instead of four hourly, for instance, it would be half hourly," Professor Abhayaratna.
"And then an escalation, which means then a different set of staff look after the patient."
Professor Abhayaratna said staff also had to listen to parents who said their child was ill.
"In fact that is included in some of the early warning systems around the country," he said.
A Current Affair said they tried four times to get a response from the Health Minister about the allegations made in the program.
Ms Stephen-Smith told The Canberra Times yesterday there was little she could say in detail because both deaths were under investigation and she did not want to compromise those investigations.
"A Current Affair did seek to interview me. It was very unclear what their story was going to be saying," the Minister said.
"And, clearly, I'm not in a position to comment on individual matters of the kind that they had already indicated that they were going to be reporting on.
"This matter is under investigation, both through internal investigation processes and before the coroner. So, I'm not in a position to say anything about that.
"It was absolutely clear that that would be their expectation if I agreed to an interview.
"We offered on multiple occasions to answer any questions they had in writing to the extent that we could do that and it was in fact the case that I was pretty much finishing up at estimates and going to the airport to get on a plane to go to Adelaide."
Ms Stephen-Smith said she had not tried to shy away from issues at the hospital.
"I think anyone in Canberra would understand that I have always been willing to stand up in relation to matters, even when they're quite difficult, quite confronting and where we've had to apologise on behalf of the ACT government when something hasn't gone quite right or hasn't met the community's expectations," she said.
"But in relation to these matters, it is very important that there are a range of investigation processes that have to be undertaken to understand exactly what occurred and to be able to respond to that.
"And it's important, I believe, that we are not put in a position where we could potentially compromise any of those investigations. So I am confident in the investigations processes that are underway.
"I, of course, have the deepest sympathies for the families involved in these really tragic circumstances. The death of any child is an absolute tragedy and my heart goes out to them.
"One of the things I think we've learnt from this experience is that maybe we need to be better at communicating with families exactly what occurs in terms of investigation in these circumstances.
"And ensuring that there is proactive support, reaching out, not only connecting people with the support services that exist through the coroner's office, but that the hospital and health services continue to reach out to families that are bereaved. To continue to ensure they are getting the support and understand the processes that are underway."
Ms Stephen-Smith also confirmed the ACT Coroner would investigate the death of Brian Lovelock, even though he passed away in NSW.
The Health Minister also reassured the community of the skilled services available at the hospital.
"So, I think it is really important for Canberrans to understand that we do a tertiary children's hospital here in the ACT. We do have high-quality paediatric services. They benchmark against other services around the country. And we do undertake constant quality assurance processes," she said.
"And when things like this happen, there are processes in place to understand exactly what happened and then act on any recommendations that might be made, either through internal reviews or through the coroner. Those are the processes that are underway at the moment and I think it's really important that we continue to respect these processes."
