A Timaru woman has lashed out at New Zealand's "trainwreck" health system experience after wrongly being told she'd need her lower leg amputated, then forced to endure an eight-month-long wait for surgery that doesn't look likely to happen anytime soon.
Debbie Cuthbert says an injury she suffered while exiting a bus in September was initially downplayed by doctors as a sprain - only to be told an entire lower leg would need to be amputated just weeks later.
To make matters worse, after coming to terms with the sobering reality of losing a limb, the amputation would never end up going ahead after another specialist said such a procedure wouldn't be necessary.
Months later, Cuthbert is still in the dark about what surgery she will need to fix her foot - and when an operation will eventually take place.
"I wouldn't leave my dog like this," she told Newshub of her situation. "How can the health system think this is OK?"
Adding to the difficulty of her situation, all this took place just after Cuthbert lost her job as a school bus driver for not complying with the Government's COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
After her injury, she went into Timaru Hospital.
"They said, 'Oh, it's just a sprain'," she recounted. "And I said to the doctor there, 'No, something's broken in here'."
The South Canterbury DHB, which oversees Timaru Hospital, has declined to comment on Cuthbert's case, saying it doesn't discuss individual circumstances.
A fortnight later, when the injury hadn't improved, Cuthbert returned to the hospital where she was told to see a physiotherapist.
"It just never got any better," she said.
"Then I was up in Christchurch for a weekend, and I started getting a red infection - so I went to the emergency centre and the doctor there was mortified. She said, 'You've been left this long with an ankle that looks like that?'"
Her GP in south Canterbury referred her to a specialist, who delivered her the worst possible news.
"He said, 'Oh, your foot's dislocated, it'll have to be amputated below the knee' - this is just before Christmas," Cuthbert explained.
"I lost my job in November… as you can imagine, to lose my job and be told my leg's got to come off was absolutely destroying and wrecked Christmas."
Cuthbert was diagnosed with a complete midfoot dislocation, as well as an ulcer over the head of the talus bone in her ankle.
"Deborah came back today with the x-rays of her foot… Unfortunately, she is now starting to develop an ulcer over the talar head. She has very poor blood supply in the foot with a capillary refill time of over 10 seconds," a letter from her orthopaedic surgeon seen by Newshub read.
"Realistically I do think she is going to need a below-knee amputation because of the compromised vascularity in her right foot within the next three to four years."
Cuthbert has now moved to Christchurch, hoping for more wraparound care due to being diabetic.
But her situation has become even more uncertain since the move, with a vascular surgeon revealing her lower leg won't need to be amputated after all.
Since being delivered that news, Cuthbert says the health system has left her waiting for answers.
"It took eight weeks to get letters signed from one doctor in Christchurch to another, to see someone about surgery. Now they've said, 'Oh you're urgent, you'll be seen within 28 days.'"
For Cuthbert, the wait has been far longer than 28 days - it's been a nearly eight-month ordeal. She wanted to know why she had been left waiting so long, unable to walk with so few answers.
"It's just such a long time and it's so frustrating," Cuthbert said. "I had to accept, 'Well, this is going to be it - this is my fate.' I have an 11-year-old daughter, I had to explain to her, 'Mum's leg's going to get chopped off.'"
The last contact Cuthbert had from the Canterbury DHB was on April 7, telling her she would receive an appointment by May 4. It's now May 7 and Newshub understands there's been no appointment.
Cuthbert said the ordeal had hugely impacted her life.
"I feel so demoralised and degraded that I have to ask my partner, my kids to do things - simple things that I can't do," she told Newshub.
"I've had to go out and buy an electric scooter so I can get around because you can't even imagine walking on the stump of your leg bone instead of your foot… it's actually painful to even get up out of a chair."
Cuthbert said she can't enjoy life again until she learns the fate of her foot, but she won't know what the scenario will be until she next sees the specialist.
"Apparently I'm 'urgent' but I've been told that since the month after I did it… The word 'urgent' doesn't really mean much in the health system, I don't think.
"It's so flawed that a person can go seven months with a severely dislocated foot, be told it's being amputated, then be told it's not."
Cuthbert believed she was far from the only person facing such delays. Her story is just one of many relating to people facing stuck on lengthy hospital waitlists due to COVID-19.
Reports suggest some Kiwis have been waiting for surgeries since even before the pandemic unfolded in 2020.
"A multi-million dollar business wouldn't be run like that," Cuthbert said of the delays. "So why is our health system so flawed?"
She said the health system was a "trainwreck".
"This is not on… when I think of someone who can't speak for themselves and just thinks, 'Oh well, it is what it is' - I can imagine the mental state they're going through."
As well as completely reforming the health system, the Government this week announced a plan to tackle hospital waiting list delays caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
But Cuthbert said that announcement was too little, too late. She hoped the wider health system reforms would improve the situation for patients but was sceptical.
"It's easy to spend millions of dollars on a review, but what is the point if that review doesn't actually work and systems aren't put in place to change and fix what's broken?"
Newshub approached the Canterbury DHB for comment, which also told Newshub it wouldn't comment on Cuthbert's case.
Health Minister Andrew Little earlier this week said health systems all around the world were impacted by the pandemic.
"I expect a national review of all waiting lists and a reassessment of the situation of everyone on it," he said when announcing a special task force to take on waiting list delays. "I also expect the task force to make full use of all health resources, including those in the private sector."
On the wider health reforms, which will scrap the 20 DHBs and create one entity known as Health New Zealand, Little said it was a "truly nationwide approach to the health problems that affect us all".
He expected the task force to complete its waiting list national review by September.
