The Malinauskas Labor Government is rolling out a range of rapid actions to improve the flow of patients through our emergency departments and reduce ramping.
This comes days after an additional 26 beds have been opened at Flinders Medical Centre, providing much needed capacity to the hospital system.
These measures will support clinicians to manage demand in the immediate term, while additional bed capacity is built as quickly as possible.
Latest figures show our hospitals are under unprecedented pressure, with people increasingly unable to access GP care presenting to hospital, often sicker and with more complex needs requiring longer stays and amid the latest COVID wave.
Despite another difficult month, ambulance response times are still tracking ahead of where they were this time last year.
The new rapid actions include:
- Weekly audits at all metro hospitals of long-stay patients
- More discharges earlier in the day, including using transit wards
- Increasing staffing for patient offloads at the new Lyell McEwin Hospital ED
- Reviewing staffing for care of emergency triage in emergency departments
- Increasing utilisation for ED diversion care services
- Placing general medicine teams in emergency departments
- Increasing use of private hospitals for private patients
- More SAAS staff at EDs to help to manage ambulance/hospital interactions
- The appointment of ramping clinical leads for the department and health networks
In addition the Government has also recently completed an upgrade of Ward 6A at Flinders Medical Centre for respiratory conditions, fitting the ward with cardiac monitoring allowing easier patient flow in the hospital.
In March across our hospitals, there was a 14 per cent increase in the most serious presentations (Category 1 and 2), compared to February.
Highlighting the GP crisis and impact on our hospitals, there was also a 20 per cent increase in the least serious cases (Category 5).
Most of these patients could have been treated in General Practice but often can’t find, or can’t afford, a GP appointment.
In addition, demand on state-run Priority Care Centres is up 23 per cent on the same time last year, and admissions to My Home Hospital up 121 per cent on the same time last year.
The demand on our hospitals resulted in ramping reaching 3,968 hours for March, a 30 per cent increase on February’s 3,036 hours.
Response time performance also declined this month for urgent Priority 1 cases, highlighting the importance of reducing ramping in order to improve response times so that more ambulances can arrive on time to patients in need. However performance was stronger than the same time last year.
For metropolitan Priority 1 ambulance cases, 60 per cent were met on time in March, compared to 59 per cent a year ago, but slightly down from 63 per cent last month.
For Priority 2 cases, 55 per cent were met on time in March, up from just 41 per cent for the same time last year, and up from 53 per cent in February.
Since being elected, the Malinauskas Government has opened every hospital bed possible to try to create more capacity.
Ultimately though the system needs more capacity to manage demand which is why the Government is spending an extra $2.4 billion on investing in health.
Our record $2.4 billion health spend also includes hiring hundreds more doctors, nurses and paramedics and building more hospital beds and ambulance stations.
By the end of next year there will be more than 150 new hospital beds and emergency bays open across the system including at the QEH, Lyell McEwin, Mt Barker, Flinders, Gawler and the Repat.
But the Government will do everything possible in the meantime to improve the system which is why we are implementing these latest rapid response measures.
The Government is also today releasing the results of Local Health Networks auditing their supply and availability of pillows, an issue highlighted in recent days but which has also been reported from time to time over many years.
The full advice from Local Health Networks is being publicly released. The hospital management advises sufficient supplies of pillows available, however continuing work to ensure they get to where they need to go. Local Health Network management have been asked to ensure systems are improved to ensure availability.
Quotes
Attributable to Chris Picton
The crumbling of bulk billing and primary health care is putting unprecedented pressure on our hospitals and we need to do all we can to improve patient flow and capacity while we build additional capacity.
When people can’t get a GP, they become sicker and are ending up in our hospitals for longer, with more complex health issues.
That’s why we are rolling out a range of rapid response measures to help get things moving faster in the immediate term, while work continues on our longer-term measures including hundreds of additional hospital beds being built.
We remain resolute in the need to fix the ramping crisis by both significantly reducing ramping and improving ambulance response times.
The Liberals ignored health and did nothing in their time in government to improve the system and now South Australians are suffering the consequences.
Labor, on the other hand, is investing a record $2.4 billion in health, opening hundreds more beds, hiring hundreds more doctors, nurses and paramedics and building more wards and ambulance stations.
The new beds now open at Flinders Medical Centre are a crucial step, the first of more than 150 more beds and ED bays to come by the end of next year.
We thank our hard-working hospital staff for their incredible work during this time of extreme pressure.
