VISITING HOSPITAL

All hospital visitors are recommended to wear a medical face mask. Expand this message for information about visiting hospital.

Last updated:
13 March 2023

Some visitor restrictions for all Te Whatu Ora Waitaha Canterbury hospitals and health facilities remain in place, but we have relaxed others.

There is still a heightened risk to vulnerable people in hospital and so we recommend all people wear a mask when visiting any of our facilities and follow other advice designed to keep patients, staff and  visitors safe.

To keep everybody safe:

  • Visitors or support people must not visit our facilities if they are unwell. Do not visit if you have recently tested positive for COVID-19 and haven’t completed your isolation period.
  • Patients may have more than one visitor, except in some situations such as multi-bed rooms where it can cause overcrowding.
  • Surgical/medical masks are recommended to be worn at all sites. Masks will be provided if you don’t have one.
  • For Specialist Mental Health Services everyone is strongly encouraged to wear a face mask in all inpatient areas and areas where consumers are receiving care (i.e. community appointments, home-visits, transporting people). Discretion may be applied in cases where masks impair your ability to communicate effectively.
  • Visitors must not eat or drink in multibed rooms because of the increased risk when multiple people remove their face mask in the same space.
  • Hand sanitiser is available and must be used.

Thank you in advance for your patience and understanding as our staff work hard to protect and care for some of the most vulnerable in our community.

Visiting patients with COVID-19

  • People can visit patients who have COVID-19 but they must wear an N95 mask – this will be provided if you don’t have one.
  • Other methods of communication will be facilitated e.g. phone, Facetime, Zoom, WhatsApp etc where visits aren’t possible.

All of our Hospitals

Visiting hours for our hospitals have returned to pre COVID-19 hours with the exception of Christchurch Women’s Hospital.

All visitors are recommended to wear a medical face mask.

Parents/caregivers are able to be with their child in hospital and visitors are now allowed, except for the Children’s Haematology and Oncology Day stay where just one parent/caregiver is able to attend their appointment with their child. Exceptions by special arrangement only.

Patients and visitors should also read the additional more detailed visiting guidelines for each specific hospital.

More COVID-19 information

Enquiries and Feedback Form

  1. Home
  2. About us
  3. Contact us
  4. Enquiries and Feedback Form

This enquiry form is not for medical emergencies or medical advice

If you require urgent medical treatment or advice please see our After Hours and Emergency information, or if you have an urgent hospital related enquiry, please contact the hospital concerned. 

We cannot give medical advice
 Please contact your doctor , visit an urgent care clinic, phone Healthline for FREE on 0800 611 116 or contact the person in charge of your medical care.

Urgent hospital related enquiries over public holidays
If you have an hospital related enquiry, please contact staff at the hospital concerned by telephone or in person. For medical emergencies, see our I’m not well where do I go? page.

For patients and/or their families enquiring about care and treatment: Please contact the hospital concerned by telephone or in person and ask for the Nurse in Charge of the ward in the first instance, or alternatively you can ask for the Duty Manager.

Enquiries from news media over public holidays: Please see our on-call media advisor roster

Enquiries to Te Whatu Ora Waitaha Canterbury (formerly Canterbury DHB)

Some health services can be contacted directly by telephone and email address rather than using this form, many other health services are listed on hospital pages and in the health services directory on this website.

Sending complaints, suggestions, compliments

We want to know what we are doing well and where we can improve. Patients, family/whānau and visitors can send us suggestions, compliments or complaints using this form. For more information about patient rights and the Health and Disability Commission Advocacy Service, see the Tell us what you think and During your visit pages, in our patients and visitors section.

Change your contact details

If you would like to change the contact information that Te Whatu Ora hold about you, including your name, address, phone number and your doctor, please use our Change your contact details form.

Official information request

To make an official information request go to our requests for official information page.

Enquiries about a patient

For enquiries about a patient, please phone the relevant hospital patient enquiries number.

Send us an enquiry or feedback

You can use this contact form to make the following types of enquiries:

When you see a * it means that it must be completed. Other fields are optional.

Page last updated: 8 January 2024

Is this page useful?