New hospital and ambulance performance data shows a continued demand for services, with a record number of emergency department presentations in the December quarter.
Minister for Health and Ambulance Services, Jenny Mikakos released the data and thanked the State’s doctors, nurses, paramedics and other medical staff for their efforts caring for a record numbers of patients.
“Victorian emergency departments saw a record 479,163 patients this [December] quarter while maintaining high levels of care,” Ms Mikakos said.
“100 per cent of category one presentations were treated immediately on arrival,” she said.
“Half of all ambulance transfers to hospital were completed within 23 minutes – well below the benchmark target of 40 minutes.”
Ms Mikakos said elective surgery patients were seen sooner than anywhere else in Australia, with national data confirming Victoria’s public hospitals were leading the nation when it came to treatment time.
She said that in quarter to December, half of the category one elective surgery patients who required treatment within 30 days received their procedure within 10 days.
The data also showed that Victorian ambulances had transported 78,820 ‘code one’ emergency patients in the same quarter – 4,513 more than the same period in 2018.
Ms Mikakos said paramedics had reached 82.5 per cent of ‘code one’ cases across the state within the benchmark 15 minutes, with an average response time of 11 minutes and 29 seconds.
