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That sounds like a good thing...
Health New Zealand says changes to allow family members to stay with hospital patients around the clock is about valuing family support, but the nurses union says the move has more to do with staffing shortages.
Ah, there's the rub.
In my experience, hospitals have always been good about visitors at any hour if you're particularly close and aren't interrupting sleep or anything (i.e. you're happy to sit quietly in the corner).
I always took visiting hours as being time for those extended relatives that never stop talking to visit and then get kicked out.
Same experience for me too.
I imagine the rules are there so that there's a way to eject excessively numerous visitors.
While writing that sentence I realized there's a cultural issue there that probably warrants an honest debate.
Interesting, we have had this rule for a long time. But, only one person is allowed to accompany the patient 24/7.
Having spent a lot of time in hospital with my wife who was in and out of the ICU, formalising this is great.
But, I have reservations. Shared hospital rooms are already loud places where patients have interrupted sleep at best. More people in there when they don't need to be is not a good thing.
That, and we should just be hiring enough nurses to do the job, and not farming off the work onto family members because this government are too laser focused on tax cuts for the wealthy, than funding basic essential services.
Ideally it'd be framed as a patient having the right to have a 24/7 support person with them. As such, a disruptive visitor can still be ejected by the hospital because the visitor isn't the one with the privilege.