The wait for non-urgent elective surgery at Dubbo Hospital blew out to 373 days in the April to June 2020 quarter as the coronavirus pandemic took hold across Australia.
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In the same period, the number of non-urgent presentations to the hospital's emergency department skyrocketed to 2239.
On March 26, the National Cabinet suspended non-urgent elective surgery but permitted urgent and some semi-urgent surgery to continue.
In late April elective surgery resumed, albeit staged.
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The suspension aimed to help hospitals preserve resources including PPE (personal protective equipment) and prepare for a possible influx of coronavirus cases.
Released this week, the Bureau of Health Information's latest Healthcare Quarterly shows how hospitals across NSW fared during and after the suspension.
It reveals elective surgery at Dubbo Hospital fell by 43.5 per cent or 446 procedures, from 1025 in the April to June 2019 quarter to 579 in the corresponding quarter this year.
Urgent procedures fell from 183 in the 2019 quarter to 156 in the 2020 quarter while semi-urgent procedures dropped from 302 to 258.
Non-urgent procedures plummeted from 435 to 119.
Waiting times for urgent, semi-urgent and non-urgent surgeries increased.
The 14-day wait for an urgent procedure in the April to June 2019 quarter grew to 16 days in the same period in 2020.
The number of days patients had to wait for semi-urgent procedures climbed from 67 to 78 days.
Patients wanting non-urgent surgeries had to wait 284 days in the 2019 quarter compared with 373 days in the same period this year.
There were 2549 people waiting for surgical procedures at the end of June this year, up from 1796 at the same time in 2019.
Emergency department presentations dropped from 8758 in the April to June 2019 quarter to 8301 in the same quarter in 2020.
Presentations in five triage categories fell except for non-urgent which rose from 1162 to 2239.