OVERCROWDED hospital emergency departments are killing more than 1500 people each year, a new report has found.
The report by the Australasian College of Emergency Medicine (ACEM) found that most of the deaths were the result of the delay in treatment for serious conditions, such as heart attacks.
Access block – caused by people waiting more than eight hours for a bed – is regarded as the biggest threat to quality emergency care.
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The report assessed 90 major emergency departments in Australia.
It found that over the last 10 years, the number of available beds fell slightly but emergency department presentations almost doubled, from 3.5 million to 6.7 million.
Sally McCarthy, ACEM vice president, said the whole system needs to change and it needs managerial and political will to fix it.
“The situation is unsustainable and dangerous,” she said.
“Patients are suffering adverse consequences and unnecessary mortality, it’s untenable for staff and it’s not using taxpayers’ money effectively.”
Dr McCarthy said the first part was recognising that emergency departments were not the best place to hold patients waiting for a ward.
“Both federal and state governments have to play a role,” she said.
“Community care, nursing home beds and the whole system needs to change to free up emergency departments when people have life-threatening illnesses.”
Federal Health Minister Nicola Roxon said the report confirmed what the Government knew - that public hospitals were under enormous stress.
“This confirms what we have been saying and working on for the last nine months,” Ms Roxon said on ABC radio.
“We accept that our hospitals are under enormous strain.”
Ms Roxon said overcrowding was a complex problem requiring “some strategic planning and change” that could not be fixed with a one-off cash injection.
“We have to get smarter and that does require a big re-think of the system as a whole.”
Ms Roxon is speaking today at a summit on emergency department overcrowding, being held by ACEM in Melbourne.
“I’m very hopeful, but also mindful of the fact that the problem has been around for a long time,” Dr McCarthy said.
Well it makes sense doesn't it, more money, better facilitites, better equipment, more training, more staff etc will make no difference at all.Once again I don't know how the people running this country think they are doing a good job let alone sleep at night.
Posted by: greg of adel 2:33pm today
To Rod Lean of Mackay Q'Ld, You may have a small point, however, what have the States done with the Billions of dollars of GST revenue? They can't think they were underfunded if they didn't put any of their own funds into it, can they????
Posted by: JJ of Brisbane 2:31pm today
I can't beleive I'm agreeing with a Wombat, but very true Wombat at comment 21. There's more to be done in Australia first before we try fixing other countries
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