To the Editor: Three articles in a recent issue of the Journal1-3 call for implementing the changes recommended in the Garling report.4 One recommendation is that the appalling practice of placing male and female patients in the same room in general wards, and sometimes in adjoining beds, “must stop immediately”.4 This practice, and the sharing of toilets and showers associated with it, exemplifies a disregard for the human dignity of patients and lack of respect for the principles underpinning consent at the level of hospital and ward management.

Trialled in the United Kingdom for reasons of economy and later banned on the grounds of patient welfare,5 the practice is not evidence-based and has been objected to in New South Wales through letters to the Minister for Health, in occasional newspaper articles, and through patient complaints to the NSW health consumer watchdog body. The responses to date point to the practice being considered acceptable by the powers that be on the basis of alleged efficient use of beds and the claim that “a hospital will make every attempt to relocate those who object”.6

Van Der Weyden,1 Stewart and Dwyer,2 and Skinner and colleagues3 cite prioritisation of recommendations, provision of funding, strong leadership, continuing consultation with clinicians and the community, and partnerships between state and federal governments as important ingredients for implementing the recommendations of the Garling report. Implementing the recommendation on mixing the sexes requires no more than an administrative edict to the effect that this practice is no longer permissible. The period of time it takes to issue this edict will be a good index of how serious we are about getting on with fixing what’s wrong in NSW hospitals.