Code Red increases at Wgtn Hospital ED, as nursing shortages continue

Report from RNZ by Kate Green
Wellington emergency department nurses say they’re struggling to have requests for paid overtime or emergency staff approved, when they need extra hands on shift.

NZ Nurses Organisation delegate Bernadette Taankink, who works as a nurse in Wellington Hospital ED, told RNZ they often found themselves run off their feet, managing large numbers of patients.

Full-time nurses were able to extend their hours easily, but when it came to calling in part-timers, those requests for overtime were, more often than not, declined by Health NZ.

That meant the brunt of the overtime work was taken on by fulltime staff, Taankink said, and those staff were increasingly burnt out.

Leaving a shift knowing her colleagues were short-staffed, with no help on the way, is extremely difficult, she said.

“They’re working under pressure – lots of patients in the corridors, lots of patients waiting in beds – and you don’t feel you’re getting the support from the rest of the hospital.”

One day last week, Taankink said, the department was down 10 nurses and overtime requests were declined.

She said there should be a level of pressure at which staff could be called in, without needing approval from higher up.

HNZ group director of operations for Capital, Coast and Hutt Valley Sarah Fenwick said no fixed staffing threshold automatically triggered overtime.

Overtime could be approved by the ED nursing leadership team, “when required to maintain safe staffing levels and support patient care”.

“Decisions are based on factors such as patient numbers, acuity, critical presentations and wider operational pressures. Workforce pressures have improved significantly.”

Taankink said, recently, their requests were declined more often than not – even when the department was in code red – leaving nurses to decide to stay on past their rostered hours to help out, or clock off on-time and leave their colleagues struggling.

Fenwick said Wellington ED had hired 45 new registered nurses in 2026, with a further 12 expected in the coming months.

“As a result, overtime has reduced from 4.6 percent in August 2025 to 2.2 percent in August 2026, while staff turnover has fallen from 2.8 percent to 1.1 percent over the same period.”

Fenwick said the need for additional or extended shifts was expected to reduce further, as staff became established in their roles.

Code red

Health NZ data shows Wellington’s ED worked in code red about half the time over the past six months.

It had risen steadily since March, when the department was logged as code red 48 percent of the time, to August, when it reached 84 percent.

HNZ explained those levels could change throughout the day, as demand and bed availability fluctuated, but a red status indicated operational pressure, and “triggered actions to support patient flow and safe care”.

“It is not, on its own, a measure of patient safety or clinical outcomes,” Fenwick said.

Taankink said she thought the actual frequency of code reds was a lot higher than that, as the status was recorded by staff on-shift and logging it could be patchy.

Despite Health NZ numbers, she said the department effectively hadn’t dropped out of code red since March.

Fenwick said the recent pressure had highlighted the importance of work to expand and relocate the ED, and increase capacity across acute services – work that was underway.