"The Variable Impact of New Public Management and Budget Cuts on the Work Intensification of Nurses and Doctors in one Public Hospital in South Australia Between 1994 and 2000"

Abstract

"This paper explores the impact of new public management and budget cuts on the work intensification of nurses and doctors in one Australia public hospital during the 1990s. These were the time-based incentives built into the Medicare Agreements of 1993-1998 and 1998-2003, and casemix Diagnosis Related Groups. These two ‘reforms’ were part of a broader micro-economic strategy underpinned by new public management processes employed by the state to increase the productivity of health professionals. The impact of these reforms on the labour of health professions was variable, however. Documentary evidence from a study conducted in a public acute hospital in South Australia, called ‘Westernvale’, illustrates that during the period 1994-2001, these reforms resulted in a longer period of work intensification, for the profession of nursing than that of medicine."