How do hospitals help patients prepare for and participate in outpatient clinics?

Background: Patients attending general medicine outpatient clinics (GM OPC) at hospital face multiple healthcare demands in an environment that has evolved with the clinician at its centre. The ideas, knowledge and understanding that patients bring to their clinic appointments are not well studied in the New Zealand setting.

Aims: To assess how hospitals prepare patients for their outpatient appointments and encourage people to participate actively in their own care.

Endoscopic Therapy for Treatment of Staple Line Leaks Post-Laparoscopic Sleeve Gastrectomy (LSG): Experience from a Large Bariatric Surgery Centre in New Zealand.

Background: Laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy (LSG) is one of the most commonly performed bariatric procedures for treatment of morbid obesity. Despite its popularity, it is not without risks, the most serious of which is the staple line leak. Staple line leaks are difficult to manage and require significant resources in the form of surgical, radiological and endoscopic interventions; long hospital and intensive care stay and significant morbidity.