Coast hospital gridlock
12:00a.m. 8th January 2009
Nambour General Hospital.
Sunshine Coast hospitals were running at 100 per cent capacity almost all of the time and that was why the average wait to be transferred from emergency to a bed was now more than seven hours at Nambour.
Australian Medical Association president elect Mason Stevenson said yesterday that the situation would continue to worsen due to chronic under funding and the region's high growth and high aged population.
But he said more beds alone were not the solution to the problem with the need to pour money into community health services to keep people out of hospital.
Opposition health spokesman Mark McArdle yesterday released figures obtained through a question in parliament which show the waiting time for transfer from emergency ward to a hospital bed had blown out at Nambour from five hours and five minutes in 2004 05 to seven hours and 13 minutes in 2007 08.
Caboolture Hospital waiting times had blown out from five hours and 23 minutes in 2004 05 to seven hours and 33 minutes last year while Caloundra was six hours and 17 minutes in 2007 08 compared with five hours 36 minutes in 2006 07.
The wait compares with a Queensland average of five hours and 57 minutes.
Figures obtained by Mr McArdle also showed that almost 400 Queenslanders had been waiting more than five years for elective surgery with a further 264 category two patients – including those with cancer and heart conditions who are supposed to be treated within 90 days – waiting between one an d two years for surgery.
Mr McArdle said the government was failing some of the state's sickest people. "These are life threatening illnesses and this government has done nothing to save these people," he said.
Mr McArdle said the figures were proof the government had mismanaged the health budget throughout the state's most prosperous period.
"In the best economic times this state has seen for many years, this government has blown the health budget and has not provided adequate care for Queenslanders," he said.
Dr Stevenson said the situation would worsen until the opening of a new $100 million, 96 bed wing at Nambour in 2011 and then would worsen again until 2014 with the opening of the first 450 bed stage of the $1.3 billion Sunshine Coast University Hospital at Kawana.
If plans to close down what would then be a 430 bed Nambour hospital went ahead he said the net bed gain for the Sunshine Coast would only be 20.
Dr Stevenson said the push was for a substantive shift to Kawana but he said good infrastructure was already in place at Nambour.
"Why build a $100 million wing and then use it for only three years,'' he asked.
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The 10 worst places for hospital gridlock in 2007-08 were:
1. Caboolture Hospital (7 hours: 33 minutes)
2. Townsville Hospital and Princess Alexandra Hospital (7 hours: 27 minutes)
3. Gold Coast Hospital (7 hours: 24 minutes)
4. Nambour Hospital (7 hours: 13 minutes)
5. Cairns Base Hospital (6 hours: 58 minutes)
6. Queen Elizabeth II Hospital and Robina Hospital (6 hours: 47 minutes)
7. Logan Hospital (6 hours: 36 minutes)
8. Caloundra Hospital (6 hours: 17 minutes).
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Recent Comments
I have private cover and wouldn't be without it as long as we can possibly afford it. There are many benefits to having private cover..too many to go in to here. Mind you though, I agree the public hospitals do a fantastic job with what they're given to work with.
After living at Rockhampton briefly they have private emergency rooms that arrange for patients to be admitted privately I believe the longest I waited at there facilities was an hour or so nothing like the wait we experience down here.
Maybe the govt should assist one of the private hospitals with a private emergency room. Rather than the people with private cover having to wait at Nambour General to be triaged, stablised and then moved.
Working in administration briefly at a hospital I have never seen QAS decline a pt transport they too have to triage and it is the hospital upon booking that assigns the patient a category.
When hospitals go on bypass the whole system gridlocks ambulance slow down and can't respond they are held up at hospitals due to no beds being available, patients that can be moved to other facilities can't because we cannot off load the QAS stretchers so there lies a problem.
Ambulances and beds are not like gremlins where they multiple when you just add water.
I believe all people working in this enivoroment do the best job they can with the minimal resources the government has allowed them to have.
Keep up the good work guys and govt stand up and be accounted for and put the money where it is required and not at the parliament canteen.
Unfortunately it looks like much of the health industry, especially pharmaceutical, seem to not be set up for proactive prevention... if only the government health departments put more money into that - there are so many natural alternatives out there!!
One quote I read is "Preventing the disease benefits no one except the patient."
An interesting site I came across is www.preventcancer.com - some food for thought reading through that. The more people who look into looking after themselves better, staying healthy and preventing illness because of that, the better.
As the old saying goes, prevention is better than a cure! (Millions and millions of dollars are being spent on the latter...)
Yes prevention is better than cure but remember they treat everyone from a minor to break to massive heart attack victim including road trauma victims. If you are hurt seriously in a car accident they take you to the public anyway. Its not the staffs fault its the government state and federal.
The other problem is the massive amount of money wasted by the Federal government on private health insurance, that's money that should be spent in the public system. Let the private system be private, no taxpayer funding.
Private health insurance is very inefficient. Something that the public don't generally see is the arguing that goes on when private insurance funds are billed by a hospital. The funds argue the toss and require the hospitals to spend vast sums of money justifying the bills. They always end up paying the bill but only after months of delay and fussing.
You can't blame private hospitals if their beds are full. They aren't run by the health funds that accept the premiums from their members. They are run by separate entities who are paid for their services by health funds. If private health fund members aren't happy that at times they can't get a bed in a private hospital then it's the funds they should complain to...not the private hospital.
And yes, let's take away any monetary incentive for people to keep their private health cover. If you think the public medical waiting lists are horrific now, then you haven't seen anything. Don't forget, working people who pay for private health cover still have to pay the medicare levy to the tune of 1.5% of taxable income.
We should keep in mind that 70% of tax is collected by the Federal Government, whilst it's the States that have the majority of responsibilities. If the 30% rebate was directed into the public system it would be in a much better shape. There are a number of public hospitals that are not run by Queensland Health, do a great job and receive the bulk of their funding from Queensland Health. Communities and not for profits can deliver great public health care.
Prior to Medicare, there use to be a good system (not perfect) where Mutual Aid societies funded public health care, but it wasn't popular with the AMA. Sir Edward (Weary) Dunlop's biography covers his work with Mutual Aid societies and could be something we should be having a look at. However the real problem is the Federal Government having the bulk of our tax money and not passing it on to the States.
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