Safe-access zones, like those around abortion clinics, could be introduced to prevent anti-euthanasia protesters harassing patients and their families outside hospitals.

The measure was floated after a group of protesters targeted cancer patients outside Melbourne’s Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre last week, handing out leaflets warning of “doctor-prescribed suicides and state-sanctioned extra-judicial executions”.

Protest buffer zones around abortion clinics, covering a 150m radius, have been in place in Victoria since 2015.

Now the state’s Health Minister Jenny Mikakos says the government would assess whether other clinics required the same protection from “appalling” behaviour.