NSW Health has experienced its busiest quarter ever in Emergency Department presentations, elective surgeries performed, Ambulance responses and babies born.
Deputy Secretary of Patient Experience and System Performance at NSW Health, Wayne Jones said that only the first week of the State’s current COVID-19 outbreak was captured in the record-breaking second quarter of 2021.
“The April-June 2021 reporting period demonstrates the resilience of the NSW Health system and, in particular, our extraordinary staff,” Mr Jones said.
“In this period, the system bounced back from the impacts of the first wave of COVID-19 and, in particular, the national halt of elective surgery in 2020,” he said.
“Through this period, our Emergency Departments were the busiest they have ever been, with a record 806,728 attendances to Emergency Departments at NSW public hospitals.”
Mr Jones said the quarter also represented a period of recovery for the system with NSW Health performing 64,599 elective surgeries, an increase of 5,330 (9.0 per cent) compared to the same quarter in 2019 and the highest number ever recorded in an April-June quarter.
The Deputy Secretary said NSW Health also reduced the number of people on the elective surgery waiting list at the end of the previous quarter by over 15 per cent (from 101,024 to 85,296).
“We were able to catch up surgeries which were delayed last year and this has put us in a much better position with the current restriction on elective surgeries in NSW as we battle the current COVID-19 outbreak,” he said.
Mr Jones said the quarter also saw a large growth in the number of babies born (19,113), with the boom corresponding with the height of the pandemic in NSW in 2020.
“These figures from April to June 2021 are not unexpected and confirm what NSW Health has been discussing publicly since early last year – the significant pressures associated with preparing for and responding to the COVID-19 pandemic,” he said.
“The best way for everyone in NSW to protect their health, the health of their loved ones and to reduce the pressure on the health system and our fantastic workforce is to get vaccinated,” Mr Jones said.
