RE Official Information Act request CDHB 10116 and WCDHB 9315
I refer to your email dated 5 June 2019 requesting the following information under the Official Information Act from Canterbury DHB and West Coast DHB.
Sexual abuse and Assault medical services for all ages on the West Coast are delivered in Christchurch, therefore numbers supplied below in our response are for both DHBs. Twelve years and under to Christchurch Hospital Paediatricians and 13 years and over to Cambridge Clinic.
1. The number of children (0-12 years old) assessed for physical signs of being sexually abused in your DHB in 2018, 2017 and 2016?
The Christchurch Hospital Paediatric team currently assesses children aged 12 years and under if a medical sexual abuse assessment is required. We started seeing children where there were concerns regarding sexual abuse on May 1st 2017 (prior to this time this work was carried out by Cambridge Clinic – please refer to Table one (overleaf)). We saw 31 children in 2017. In 2018 we saw 32 children, including children from the West Coast. The numbers seen from the West Coast are very small, we are therefore declining to provide specific West Coast numbers under section 9(2)(a) of the Official Information Act i.e. “…to protect the privacy of natural persons, including those deceased.”
2. For how many of these cases did a DHB clinician attend a court hearing with respect to a report?
We do not keep formal records of court attendances. (Declined under section 18(g) of the Official Information Act “i.e. …we do not hold this information.”
3. The number of people aged 13 years and over who were assessed for physical signs of being sexually abused in your DHB in 2018, 2017 and 2016?
This service is contracted to Cambridge Clinic. Please refer to table one (overleaf) for the number of people aged 13 years and over from Canterbury and West Coast who were assessed for physical signs of being sexually abused 2016 – 2018. Note This data also includes children (0-12 years old) seen by Cambridge Clinic prior to the Christchurch Hospital Paediatric team taking over this service in 2017.
4. For how many of these cases in each of these years, did a DHB clinician attend a court hearing with respect to a report?
We do not keep formal records of court attendances. (Declined under section 18(g) of the Official Information Act “i.e. …we do not hold this information.”