Western Australian Current Acts

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HEALTH (MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS) ACT 1911 - SECT 335

335 .         Reports to be furnished

        (1)         It shall be the duty of every midwife to furnish to the Chief Health Officer a report in writing in the manner and at the time and in the form prescribed of every case attended by the midwife, whether of living, premature or full term birth, or stillbirth, or abortion.

        (2)         A report furnished under subsection (1) shall state the name and address of the mother, and shall be furnished to the Chief Health Officer within 48 hours of the event.

        (3)         A midwife who contravenes subsection (1) as read with subsection (2) commits an offence.

        (4)         The occupier of any house at which a female not usually resident in any such house, is attended, whether for gain or not, during childbirth or abortion or miscarriage, shall forthwith notify to the Chief Health Officer that such female is being so attended.

        (5)(a)         When a medical practitioner attends on the happening of any premature birth, stillbirth or abortion (other than an abortion to which paragraph (d) applies), the medical practitioner shall send to the Chief Health Officer within 48 hours of the happening a report in the prescribed form.

            (b)         A medical practitioner, or where a medical practitioner is not in attendance, a midwife, who attends a woman at the delivery of a foetus at any time after the 20th week of pregnancy shall notify the Chief Health Officer of the attendance in the prescribed form.

            (c)         A medical practitioner who, for the purposes of section 44 of the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1998 , certifies the cause of a neonatal death shall notify the Chief Health Officer of the fact in the prescribed form within 48 hours of the certification.

            (d)         When a medical practitioner performs an abortion, the medical practitioner shall notify the Chief Health Officer of the fact in the prescribed form within 14 days of the abortion being performed.

            (e)         A notification under paragraph (d) must not contain any particulars from which it may be possible to ascertain the identity of the patient.

        (6)(a)         The Governor may from time to time proclaim that the provisions of this subsection shall apply in respect of any district or part of a district and may from time to time proclaim that those provisions shall cease to apply in respect of, or having ceased to apply shall again apply in respect of any district or part of a district.

            (b)         The provisions of this subsection shall apply in respect of a district and part of a district so long as those provisions remain the subject of a proclamation to that effect under the provisions of the last preceding paragraph.

            (c)         The Chief Health Officer shall appoint medical practitioners upon such terms and conditions as the Chief Health Officer considers fit to conduct a post mortem examination upon the body of every stillborn child where the still birth happens in any district or part of a district to which the provisions of this subsection apply.

            (d)         The Chief Health Officer shall notify in the prescribed manner all medical practitioners and midwives of the name and address of every medical practitioner appointed under the provisions of the last preceding paragraph and acting under the appointment.

            (e)         When a stillbirth happens in any district or part of a district to which the provisions of this subsection apply, the medical practitioner attending or, if there is no medical practitioner attending, the midwife attending, shall, so soon as reasonably possible after the happening, report it in the manner and form prescribed, to a medical practitioner appointed under paragraph (c) and acting under the appointment, who shall, unless otherwise authorised or directed by the Chief Health Officer, thereupon conduct a post mortem examination on the body of the stillborn child.

        [Section 335, formerly section 263, amended: No. 17 of 1918 s. 48; renumbered as section 335: No. 38 of 1933 s. 42; amended: No. 14 of 1944 s. 12; No. 71 of 1948 s. 12; No. 45 of 1954 s. 12; No. 113 of 1965 s. 8(1); No. 102 of 1973 s. 25; No. 28 of 1984 s. 45; No. 80 of 1987 s. 151; No. 27 of 1992 s. 84; No. 15 of 1998 s. 7(2); No. 40 of 1998 s. 14(4); No. 19 of 2016 s. 36, 99 and 100.]



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