Jeremy Rockliff,Minister for Health
A new Inter-Hospital Transfer Policy (IHT) is set to improve patient experience and reduce waiting times for patients requiring a transfer between hospitals within the Tasmanian health system.
The IHT Policy will deliver a consistent statewide pathway for transferring patients and means patients who arrive from another facility will not be required to be re-admitted through the Emergency Department.
Typically, a patient is transferred to a different hospital due to their need for a higher level of care, or to be admitted to a health facility closer to home.
Currently, when a patient is transferred, they are often required to be re-admitted through the Emergency Department, which can cause delays and contribute to ramping.
Under the new IHT Policy, patients transferred between health facilities will be authorised by a practitioner for direct transfer to a destination ward, bypassing the ED when it is clinically appropriate to do so.
The IHT Policy will reduce the need for a repeated clinical assessment for patients transferred from another hospital, which will increase capacity for our Emergency Department to treat other patients.
This Policy will not only ease the pressure on our Emergency Departments, but it will also help address broader access and flow challenges in our hospitals and support an efficient patient handover process between Ambulance and hospital staff.
Importantly, it will allow our Ambulances to get back out on the road quicker, to be ready to respond to other cases.
The IHT Policy has been developed as part of our Statewide Access and Patient Flow Program in partnership with the Statewide Integrated Operations Centre Working Group, Ambulance Tasmania and other key stakeholders.
The Tasmanian Liberal Government is committed to implementing hospital-based strategies that reduce the pressure on our Emergency Departments and improve access and flow throughout our hospitals so that Tasmanians can get the right care, in the right place, at the right time.
