PUBLIC HOSPITAL MELTDOWN IN AUSTRALIA

"Hospitals in metropolitan Sydney are the most pressured in the country, with half of all beds in emergency departments taken up by people who have been waiting more than eight hours to be admitted to a ward, a survey shows. Many hospitals were operating above 95 per cent capacity, the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine warned, because of extensive bed closures across the system. "It is the single most important cause of emergency department overcrowding," said the college's president, Ian Knox.

Australian Medical Association data show a steep drop in the availability of hospital beds, from 5.2 per 1000 people in 1967-68 to less than half that in 2002-03.

The situation was dire all around the country, Dr Knox said, with more than 80 per cent of patients waiting more than eight hours in emergency departments before being admitted to a hospital ward. But the solutions favoured by the state and federal governments, including increasing funding to emergency departments or establishing GP clinics, would do nothing to fix the crisis, he said. "Opening the beds is the first step, but then there needs to be precision bed management at the same time".

Based on a snapshot taken on August 30 of 73 hospitals and 1509 patients across the country, the college found 39 per cent of all emergency beds were taken by patients who had been waiting for an in-patient bed for more than eight hours. In metropolitan Sydney the figure was 52 per cent. The snapshot confirmed data from an identical survey done on May 30. Dr Knox acknowledged there was always a winter peak in emergency department presentations but said the bed crisis was a years-old problem.

"The demand for beds is going up as the population ages, so [governments] really need to look at projected demand and understand there is an increasing requirement of hospital beds," he said. Mass bed closures and the resulting access block from emergency departments to wards started in Sydney but now affected every part of Australia.

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ELDERLY LOOKED AFTER: IN THEORY

Two months to see a doctor????

"Kath Brewster lives on the front line of an ageing society. In Coffs Harbour, her home for 18 years, the septugenarian faces up to two months' wait to see her GP. "He's a good, caring GP, and when I rang a fortnight ago I was told his books were closed for August and September, and to ring back in October," she said.

A report called Older People, NSW, published yesterday, shows elderly people aged 65 and over will outnumber children aged 0-14 for the first time by 2016.....

Already more than 18 per cent of the population on the mid-North Coast is elderly, and Ms Brewster is feeling the pinch. "The biggest issue is health," she said. "There aren't enough doctors or nurses. It's impossible to make a quick appointment with a GP so people are going to hospital emergency departments.".....

However, Gary Moore, director of the NSW Council of Social Service, said the pressure would be on the Government to deliver to areas outside Sydney an acceptable suite of health and community services. "A significant proportion of the elderly population will be low income, especially those living in inland centres such as Kempsey," he said."

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