What Safe Really Feels Like in Hospital

The system is busy. That’s not an excuse.

NSW has one of the biggest, most complex health systems in the world. Pearce knows how hard staff work under pressure. But she doesn’t let that become an excuse for poor treatment or missed care.

“We have very busy hospitals. They’re under a lot of pressure all the time,” she says. “But I really think it is that business of stopping and pausing and remembering that people do come to our hospitals with different cultural backgrounds… and different things going on in their lives, which may include being fearful.”

For patients, especially those who’ve experienced antisemitism or other discrimination, that fear isn’t abstract. It shapes how they respond, what they disclose, and whether they speak up when something doesn’t feel right.

Trauma doesn’t always look like trauma.

One of the most important parts of the episode comes when Rabbi Kastel raises how trauma can show up in unexpected ways.

“There’s even more than that, and that is past traumas… Holocaust survivors. So there’s other kinds of things that are beyond your day-to-day way of seeing people.”

Pearce agrees, and says recognising those invisible pressures is essential to good care.

“We do have trauma-informed practices and education for our staff… but this really is a whole-of-system issue.” She adds that not all patients are starting from the same place. “Not everybody enters a hospital or a health service on an equal footing… I don’t think there’s ill intent amongst our staff necessarily… but I do think it requires a different level of mindfulness.”