Performance Reports
Quarterly Hospital Performance Report - October to December 2008 (new format)
Emergency Department performance
From October to December 2008 there were 502,216 attendances at NSW public hospital Emergency Departments (EDs), a decrease of 4,917 attendances (1.0%) from the same quarter last year. During the same period, admissions from EDs increased by 2,082 (1.9%) to reach 109,797.
Triage Performance remained above benchmark levels in four of the five Triage categories, with only Triage 3 performance (70%) falling below the recommended threshold (75%).
Emergency Admission Performance (the percentage of admissions transferred from the ED within 8 hours) was 76%, while Off Stretcher Time performance (the percentage of ambulance arrivals transferred to the care of the ED within 30 minutes) was 75% for the quarter.
Admitted patients
There were 388,951 admitted patient episodes this quarter, an increase of 6,255 episodes (1.6%) from the same period last year. The average length of stay for acute admitted patients was 3.6 days.
There were 17,574 babies born, a decrease of 95 babies (0.5%) from the same period last year.
Elective Surgery
The proportion of Elective Surgery patients who were admitted within the waiting time recommended by their doctor was 90% this quarter, increasing from 88% in the same period last year.
In Category 1, 92% of patients were admitted within 30 days, with a median waiting time of 10 days. In Category 2, 81% of patients were admitted within 90 days, with a median waiting time of 49 days. In Category 3, 95% of patients were admitted within 365 days, with a median waiting time of 111 days.
Demand on Emergency Departments
NSW Health, like other states, experienced a significant increase in Emergency Department (ED) demand in 2005/06. In August 2007 Booz Allen Hamilton was commissioned to analyse what the key drivers of demand were and to assess underlying root causes contributing to the increase in ED demand. The study was, in particular, focused on exploring the question whether the demand for emergency department services had been increasing as a result of 'demand transfer' from primary care.