17 November 2004

Auditor General's Report

The NSW Auditor General’s report released today confirms that in the face of increasing activity in public hospitals, health system performance in four of the five emergency triage categories either meets benchmark performance or has improved on last year, Health Minister Morris Iemma said today.

“The Auditor General has today again confirmed that 100% of life threatening emergency cases that present to NSW emergency rooms are seen within the two minute benchmark,” Mr Iemma said.

“Today’s report shows that our health system is continuing to provide timely care to those most critically injured and ill who present to the emergency department,” Health Minister Morris Iemma said.

“This is an important performance benchmark and it is being consistently met.

“The Auditor has found that in Triage Categories Three and Four, health system performance has shown a slight improvement in the last 12 months.

“While in Category 5 state-wide performance is above the benchmark.

“There is still more work to be done to lift performance in the intermediate categories and we are doing that,” Mr Iemma said.

The Minister said the performance data contained in the Auditor General’s report co-incides with a 4.8% increase in admissions through metropolitan emergency departments.

“That means more patients who present to our emergency departments require admission to a ward bed,” Mr Iemma said.

“The number of patients admitted to hospitals increased by 17,000 on the previous year while the number of outpatient services increased by more than 800,000.

“Even with this increase in demand, the number of patients waiting more than the recommended time in categories three and four is showing signs of improvement and our hardworking hospital staff should be congratulated for their efforts,” Mr Iemma said.

The Minister said the NSW Government had implemented a series of plans to address the issue of Access Block in hospitals, including opening more than 900 beds across this year’s winter peak and deploying Hospital Improvement Teams to our busiest hospitals.

For a range of health information, go online to www.health.nsw.gov.au