Page 1591 - Week 05 - Thursday, 15 May 2014

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seen but they are not as sick as category 2 and category 1 patients. I would say that in both of those categories we are meeting timeliness—in categories 1 and 2, which are our most urgent patients. The area I would like to see further significant improvement in is in the category 3 mark, because people are still quite unwell but they are triaged below those with more urgent conditions. We have seen very substantial growth in presentations in the category 2 timeliness criteria.

When you talk to the doctors around this particular target, you find that there is an argument around whether this is the most useful way of measuring performance. That is why we have moved to the four-hour rule. This is merely a measure of time to actually get treatment started. In some jurisdictions, the clock stops when a nurse comes or a panadol is given, for example. In our hospital we have a different standard; it is when you are seen by the doctor that stops the clock. As to whether it is the most useful way of measuring performance, the jury is out on it, but I think that probably for me the four-hour rule gives you a much better point of patient experience, because that is their whole journey—their arrival, their experience within the ED, and they are discharged either back to the community or into the hospital. That is the one we are focusing on.

MADAM SPEAKER: A supplementary question, Ms Porter.

MS PORTER: Minister, will there be an effect on the presentations to emergency departments in the ACT from the introduction of the GP co-payment?

MS GALLAGHER: It is going to be something we have to watch. It will be difficult to predict. I think most commentators and experts in health would argue that you would see some flowthrough to the emergency department. We expect, in Canberra, there may be an impact on the nurse-led walk-in centres as well if the GP-type patient is looking for access to quick, free care. Both of those in Tuggeranong and Belconnen are opening in the next couple of months. So we will watch both the nurse-led walk-in centres, and the impact on them, and the emergency department as well.

I would say that we have a higher than average presentation to our emergency department of anywhere in the country. So we know that people are already coming to the emergency department at a much faster rate than in other jurisdictions. But it is definitely something that we will keep an eye on.

MADAM SPEAKER: Supplementary question, Mr Hanson.

MR HANSON: Minister, why is it that other jurisdictions facing similar population pressures have performed better over the last decade than the ACT?

MS GALLAGHER: I am not privy to that level of detail of other jurisdictions. They may have had population growth, but has that translated into a three times faster rate of presentations to the emergency department? I do not have that data available to me and I am not sure whether it is reported anywhere, either. What I do know in Canberra is that in the last four to five years we have had a nine per cent population growth and a 25 per cent increase in presentations to the emergency department.


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