Victoria’s public hospitals continue to see record demand with huge numbers of patients calling ambulances, attending emergency departments and being admitted to hospital from EDs over the past three months.
Minister for Health and Ambulance Services Jenny Mikakos today released the hospital and ambulance performance data for the December quarter and thanked our hard-working doctors, nurses, paramedics and other medical staff for their efforts caring for record numbers of patients.
Victorian emergency departments saw a record 479,163 patients this quarter while maintaining high levels of care, with 100 per cent of Category 1 presentations treated immediately on arrival.
Half of all ambulance transfers to hospital were completed within 23 minutes – well below the benchmark target of 40 minutes.
Victorian elective surgery patients are also being seen sooner than in anywhere else in Australia, with national data released today confirming our public hospitals are leading the nation when it comes to treatment time.
In the December quarter, of the Category 1 elective surgery patients who require treatment within 30 days – half received their procedure within 10 days, helping them get back on their feet sooner.
The Andrews Labor Government’s reforms to outpatient and specialist clinics has also led to sustained improvement in wait times, with half of all urgent first appointments seen within 16 days – matching the record achieved last quarter.
Clinic visits have been boosted by the Labor Government’s $136.2 million investment in 500,000 specialist appointments in regional Victoria.
Victoria’s ambulances transported a massive 78,820 code 1 emergency patients in the three months to the end of December – 4,513 more than a year earlier. Paramedics reached 82.5 per cent of Code 1 cases across the state within the benchmark 15 minutes, with an average response time of 11 minutes and 29 seconds.
That’s nearly two minutes faster than the same period in 2014, when the Liberals’ war with paramedics saw just 74.1 per cent of ambulances arriving within 15 minutes.
This year, the Labor Government delivered a $2.5 billion boost to hospitals’ operating budgets and is getting on with delivering a huge $7 billion pipeline of hospital projects to back hospitals to do what they do best.
Quotes attributable to Minister for Health Jenny Mikakos
“I thank our dedicated doctors, nurses, paramedics and hospital staff who are caring for more patients than ever, with record numbers of ambulance call-outs, emergency department presentations and hospital admissions.”
“Victorians waiting for elective surgery are being seen sooner than anywhere else in Australia and our big boost to specialist appointments means more regional patients are getting specialist care closer to home.”
“We’re proud of our paramedics, reaching ill and injured Victorians almost two minutes faster on average than they did under the Liberals, when response times blew out to the worst on the Australian mainland.”
Reviewed 30 July 2020