Page 483 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 5 March 2008
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cent. Some 83 per cent of category 5 patients were seen on time, which is above the national target of 70 per cent.
This is what I am saying: we are seeing improvements. These have been as a result of staff delivering gains through the access improvement program. There has been the introduction of the fast track service; the commissioning of a registrar review clinic; and the provision of a triage nurse in the waiting area. And there has been the establishment of the medical assessment and planning unit, known as MAPU, which gets older patients, in particular, out of the emergency department—the ones who have normally stayed much longer because of their complex needs. That frees up the ED for others in need.
In relation to elective surgery, last year 9,310 elective surgery operations were delivered. That was 1,649 more than in the first year of our government. Over the last five years, the additional funding we have put in has enabled more than 5,000 people to access elective surgery who would not have been able to do so if we had not invested in those additional services.
The government has no control over the waiting lists for elective surgery. Doctors place people on waiting lists. The only thing the government can do to improve waiting times for people is to make sure that we are delivering as much elective surgery as we can. That requires funding by the government. In every budget, we have provided that funding. We have commissioned the 10th operating theatre at Canberra Hospital, which means that all our operating theatres are in full use. They operate for extended hours. They can be used at the weekend.
From our recent negotiations with the commonwealth government, we received $2.5 million for extra elective surgery. The reason we got only $2.5 million was recognition that the ACT government had invested so many resources and so much extra work in elective surgery that, based on our current infrastructure, we would not be able to delivery any more. That is because all our theatres, all our staff and all our doctors are working 100 per cent in terms of delivering elective surgery.
Let me go to emergency surgery for a moment. Over the 2006-07 year, emergency surgery at public hospitals increased by 11 per cent—over the two years 2006 and 2007. With emergency surgery increasing by 11 per cent—just think about that in terms of the sheer numbers of procedures performed—that would normally come at the cost of elective surgery; there would be absolutely no way that you could take on board an 11 per cent growth in emergency surgery and keep your elective surgery going. But because we have our 10 theatres operating at TCH, we have all of the theatres at Calvary operating and we have doctors and theatre staff who are prepared to work at weekends and for extended hours, we have been able to maintain our target for elective surgery. This year we aim to reach 9,600-odd procedures. That is based on the resources that we have put in and also on the commitment of staff to make sure that our elective surgery does not come at the cost of emergency surgery, which has happened in the past. Our hospital initiated postponement of elective surgery has considerably reduced, and that is a direct result of us being able to maintain that elective capacity.
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