Taskforce to Resolve Challenging Hospital Wait Times
The New South Wales (NSW) premier, Chris Minns, announced the creation of a taskforce this morning with the aim to reduce waiting times for patients in the emergency department. The need for such a taskforce comes after recent reports from the Bureau of Health Information (BHI) and the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW).
According to an AIHW report, 90 percent of patients visiting the emergency department are seen within two hours and four minutes. They also report that 90 percent of patients in the emergency department are completed with a mean time of 10 hours and 32 minutes. On the other hand, BHI reports that 56.6 percent of patients in the emergency department spent within four hours to be discharged, marking the worst time since the start of their statistics in 2010. Changes will be implemented throughout NSW rural and urban hospitals to address these issues. This includes addressing important issues such as upgrading patient flow, improving the time of discharge, enhancing the experience of patients in the emergency department, and more.
According to BHI reports, 67 percent of all patients who attended the emergency department started their treatment on time this year, which is an improvement from last year. There were also 771,744 patients who attended the emergency department, marking a 3.6 percent improvement from last year. NSW Health Deputy Secretary, Adjunct Professor Matthew Daly, recognized the performance of NSW public hospitals as the best in the country for their service in emergency departments. He stated that the hospitals ensured patients continued to receive high-quality care during periods of sustained high demand. Minister for Health, Ryan Park, spoke about the new task force, stating it is the “latest initiative in our suite of measures to improve wait times and access to care.” He also expressed his pride in the healthcare workers who have faced serious challenges, and he appreciated the outstanding healthcare workers who performed exceptionally well throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.
