Doctors and nurses are getting to patients faster at Dubbo Hospital’s Emergency Department (ED), a rising star on the health horizon.
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The Bureau of Health Information’s (BHI) report for October to December 2017 reveals they are reducing waiting times to treatment in all four triage categories as compared with the same period in 2016.
Waiting times in the emergency, urgent, semi-urgent and non-urgent triage categories in the 2017 quarter were shorter than the state average.
The BHI’s latest quarterly report also reveals 74.6 per cent of patients spent four hours or less in the ED as compared with the NSW figure of 73.6.
Across October, November and December 2017, 999 emergency patients waited an average of six minutes to be treated at Dubbo Hospital’s ED, down from nine minutes in the same period in 2016. The average wait for emergency patients in NSW in the 2017 quarter was eight minutes.
ED staff began treating 2857 urgent patients after an average 16 minutes in the 2017 quarter compared with 22 minutes in the 2016 quarter. On average, urgent patients in NSW waited 20 minutes to be treated in the 2017 quarter.
In the semi-urgent category, 3603 patients were treated after an average 17 minutes, down from 30 minutes in the 2016 quarter. The average waiting time in NSW in the 2017 quarter for semi-urgent patients was 26 minutes.
The ED’s 730 non-urgent patients in the 2017 quarter waited an average 13 minutes as compared with 30 minutes in the 2016 quarter. The average waiting time for non-urgent treatment in NSW in the 2017 quarter was 23 minutes.
Emergency presentations at the ED fell by 0.3 per cent to 8210 in the 2017 quarter with 82.3 per cent of them receiving treatment on time, representing an 11 per cent increase.
Dubbo Hospital general manager Debbie Bickerton attributes the improved performance to an increase in staff. She said since June 2017 the ED had benefited from an extra registered nurse and the appointment of a registrar. The positions are now permanent.
Ms Bickerton has also highlighted improvement in the transfer of patients from ambulances to hospital care with 94.3 per cent of patients transferred within 30 minutes . More stories on the BHI data will appear in coming days.