❓ The Minister for Health outlines steps taken to address increased demand on public hospitals during the flu season, including emergency department upgrades, increased bed capacity, additional nurses, GP clinics in emergency departments, and increased ambulance resources. Data suggests improvements in ambulance diversion times.
AnsweredQoN 431Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
With the onset of winter, can the minister advise the House what steps the Government is taking to ensure that our public hospitals are able to cope with the extra demand typically associated with the flu season? Mr J.A. McGINTY
AnswerView source ↗
I thank the member for Wanneroo for the question. I advise the House that Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital this morning officially opened its new $9.5 million emergency department. It is a world-class facility that will cater for up to 45 000 patients a year. It is part of an ongoing program of upgrading and refurbishing our emergency departments. We have allocated $22 million to improve public hospital emergency departments. The effect of this has already been seen at Rockingham-Kwinana District Hospital, with a $10.3 million refurbishment. Swan District Hospital will get a new observation ward and computerised tomography scanner at a cost of $1.9 million, King Edward Memorial Hospital will get $1.9 million for refurbishment and Princess Margaret Hospital for Children will get $900 000 for additional treatment and consulting rooms. In addition to those refurbishments, the Government has a program to ensure that our emergency departments cope this winter. We have provided $20 million to open 322 extra hospital beds. With the exception of 64 beds, which will open in July principally at Royal Perth Hospital, those 322 beds are now substantially open. We have also employed 1 100 more salaried nurses in the government hospital system since we came to government three and a half years ago. This is enabling us to do a great many things. As members will be aware, we have opened general practitioner clinics associated with emergency departments to deal with low acuity patients. After one month in operation, those two centres at Royal Perth and Fremantle Hospitals have between them dealt with more than 630 patients who have been taken out of the emergency departments, where they otherwise would have had to wait a long period. In addition, much to the delight of St John Ambulance, we have concluded a $34.7 million contract increase to enable the association to provide more ambulances and more ambulance officers and technology to improve response times. The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
Mr J.A. McGINTY replied: I thank the member for Wanneroo for the question. I advise the House that Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital this morning officially opened its new $9.5 million emergency department. It is a world-class facility that will cater for up to 45 000 patients a year. It is part of an ongoing program of upgrading and refurbishing our emergency departments. We have allocated $22 million to improve public hospital emergency departments. The effect of this has already been seen at Rockingham-Kwinana District Hospital, with a $10.3 million refurbishment. Swan District Hospital will get a new observation ward and computerised tomography scanner at a cost of $1.9 million, King Edward Memorial Hospital will get $1.9 million for refurbishment and Princess Margaret Hospital for Children will get $900 000 for additional treatment and consulting rooms. In addition to those refurbishments, the Government has a program to ensure that our emergency departments cope this winter. We have provided $20 million to open 322 extra hospital beds. With the exception of 64 beds, which will open in July principally at Royal Perth Hospital, those 322 beds are now substantially open. We have also employed 1 100 more salaried nurses in the government hospital system since we came to government three and a half years ago. This is enabling us to do a great many things. As members will be aware, we have opened general practitioner clinics associated with emergency departments to deal with low acuity patients. After one month in operation, those two centres at Royal Perth and Fremantle Hospitals have between them dealt with more than 630 patients who have been taken out of the emergency departments, where they otherwise would have had to wait a long period. In addition, much to the delight of St John Ambulance, we have concluded a $34.7 million contract increase to enable the association to provide more ambulances and more ambulance officers and technology to improve response times. The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
I thank the member for Wanneroo for the question. I advise the House that Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital this morning officially opened its new $9.5 million emergency department. It is a world-class facility that will cater for up to 45 000 patients a year. It is part of an ongoing program of upgrading and refurbishing our emergency departments. We have allocated $22 million to improve public hospital emergency departments. The effect of this has already been seen at Rockingham-Kwinana District Hospital, with a $10.3 million refurbishment. Swan District Hospital will get a new observation ward and computerised tomography scanner at a cost of $1.9 million, King Edward Memorial Hospital will get $1.9 million for refurbishment and Princess Margaret Hospital for Children will get $900 000 for additional treatment and consulting rooms. In addition to those refurbishments, the Government has a program to ensure that our emergency departments cope this winter. We have provided $20 million to open 322 extra hospital beds. With the exception of 64 beds, which will open in July principally at Royal Perth Hospital, those 322 beds are now substantially open. We have also employed 1 100 more salaried nurses in the government hospital system since we came to government three and a half years ago. This is enabling us to do a great many things. As members will be aware, we have opened general practitioner clinics associated with emergency departments to deal with low acuity patients. After one month in operation, those two centres at Royal Perth and Fremantle Hospitals have between them dealt with more than 630 patients who have been taken out of the emergency departments, where they otherwise would have had to wait a long period. In addition, much to the delight of St John Ambulance, we have concluded a $34.7 million contract increase to enable the association to provide more ambulances and more ambulance officers and technology to improve response times. The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
In addition to those refurbishments, the Government has a program to ensure that our emergency departments cope this winter. We have provided $20 million to open 322 extra hospital beds. With the exception of 64 beds, which will open in July principally at Royal Perth Hospital, those 322 beds are now substantially open. We have also employed 1 100 more salaried nurses in the government hospital system since we came to government three and a half years ago. This is enabling us to do a great many things. As members will be aware, we have opened general practitioner clinics associated with emergency departments to deal with low acuity patients. After one month in operation, those two centres at Royal Perth and Fremantle Hospitals have between them dealt with more than 630 patients who have been taken out of the emergency departments, where they otherwise would have had to wait a long period. In addition, much to the delight of St John Ambulance, we have concluded a $34.7 million contract increase to enable the association to provide more ambulances and more ambulance officers and technology to improve response times. The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
Mr J.A. McGINTY replied: I thank the member for Wanneroo for the question. I advise the House that Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital this morning officially opened its new $9.5 million emergency department. It is a world-class facility that will cater for up to 45 000 patients a year. It is part of an ongoing program of upgrading and refurbishing our emergency departments. We have allocated $22 million to improve public hospital emergency departments. The effect of this has already been seen at Rockingham-Kwinana District Hospital, with a $10.3 million refurbishment. Swan District Hospital will get a new observation ward and computerised tomography scanner at a cost of $1.9 million, King Edward Memorial Hospital will get $1.9 million for refurbishment and Princess Margaret Hospital for Children will get $900 000 for additional treatment and consulting rooms. In addition to those refurbishments, the Government has a program to ensure that our emergency departments cope this winter. We have provided $20 million to open 322 extra hospital beds. With the exception of 64 beds, which will open in July principally at Royal Perth Hospital, those 322 beds are now substantially open. We have also employed 1 100 more salaried nurses in the government hospital system since we came to government three and a half years ago. This is enabling us to do a great many things. As members will be aware, we have opened general practitioner clinics associated with emergency departments to deal with low acuity patients. After one month in operation, those two centres at Royal Perth and Fremantle Hospitals have between them dealt with more than 630 patients who have been taken out of the emergency departments, where they otherwise would have had to wait a long period. In addition, much to the delight of St John Ambulance, we have concluded a $34.7 million contract increase to enable the association to provide more ambulances and more ambulance officers and technology to improve response times. The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
I thank the member for Wanneroo for the question. I advise the House that Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital this morning officially opened its new $9.5 million emergency department. It is a world-class facility that will cater for up to 45 000 patients a year. It is part of an ongoing program of upgrading and refurbishing our emergency departments. We have allocated $22 million to improve public hospital emergency departments. The effect of this has already been seen at Rockingham-Kwinana District Hospital, with a $10.3 million refurbishment. Swan District Hospital will get a new observation ward and computerised tomography scanner at a cost of $1.9 million, King Edward Memorial Hospital will get $1.9 million for refurbishment and Princess Margaret Hospital for Children will get $900 000 for additional treatment and consulting rooms. In addition to those refurbishments, the Government has a program to ensure that our emergency departments cope this winter. We have provided $20 million to open 322 extra hospital beds. With the exception of 64 beds, which will open in July principally at Royal Perth Hospital, those 322 beds are now substantially open. We have also employed 1 100 more salaried nurses in the government hospital system since we came to government three and a half years ago. This is enabling us to do a great many things. As members will be aware, we have opened general practitioner clinics associated with emergency departments to deal with low acuity patients. After one month in operation, those two centres at Royal Perth and Fremantle Hospitals have between them dealt with more than 630 patients who have been taken out of the emergency departments, where they otherwise would have had to wait a long period. In addition, much to the delight of St John Ambulance, we have concluded a $34.7 million contract increase to enable the association to provide more ambulances and more ambulance officers and technology to improve response times. The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
In addition to those refurbishments, the Government has a program to ensure that our emergency departments cope this winter. We have provided $20 million to open 322 extra hospital beds. With the exception of 64 beds, which will open in July principally at Royal Perth Hospital, those 322 beds are now substantially open. We have also employed 1 100 more salaried nurses in the government hospital system since we came to government three and a half years ago. This is enabling us to do a great many things. As members will be aware, we have opened general practitioner clinics associated with emergency departments to deal with low acuity patients. After one month in operation, those two centres at Royal Perth and Fremantle Hospitals have between them dealt with more than 630 patients who have been taken out of the emergency departments, where they otherwise would have had to wait a long period. In addition, much to the delight of St John Ambulance, we have concluded a $34.7 million contract increase to enable the association to provide more ambulances and more ambulance officers and technology to improve response times. The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
The benefits of this strategy, comprehensive as it is, are already evident. For the past two months, which are typically busy months as it the beginning of winter, ambulance diversion figures for tertiary hospitals were 73 per cent lower than for the corresponding two months last year. In June this year hospitals spent a total of 66 hours on ambulance diversion, and there was only one occasion on which all three hospitals were on diversion. This compares with 204 hours on diversion in June last year with 12 triple diversions. In May 2004, diversion hours totalled 51 hours with no triple diversions. In May 2003, hospitals spent 228 hours on diversion with seven triple diversions. We have seen a dramatic turnaround in the performance of the emergency departments so far this winter. It is early days. Emergency departments, by their very nature, are always under intense pressure. I take this opportunity to compliment the doctors and nurses who staff the emergency departments at the front line. We will give them the support they need and, in return, we are already seeing the capacity of emergency departments to cope. I hope that every member of this House will extend their congratulations for the excellent job done by the doctors and nurses in the emergency departments.
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