Hospitals under siege as flu season adds to crisis

Media release from the AMA (WA)

AMA (WA) President Prof Gary Geelhoed outlines the crisis facing emergency departments and the impact of swine flu on PMH.

Major public hospitals are close to meltdown as hundreds of men, women and children flood emergency departments, many of them victims of WA's worsening flu season.

"For more than a week our hospitals have been under siege and the situation is growing more serious by the day,' said AMA (WA) President Prof Gary Geelhoed.

"Hospitals are trying to operate over capacity and until they get the extra beds and resources they need, patients will have dangerously long waiting times causing unnecessary suffering."

Prof Geelhoed said the situation had reached crisis point in the last 24 hours resulting in:

• More than 250 children attending the emergency department at Princess Margaret Hospital, many with flu symptoms. Most children had to wait up to 90 minutes to see a doctor;
• At 9am this morning, 110 patients were still queuing in emergency departments at Perth's three major hospitals. Many had waited up to six hours to be seen by a doctor and a number had to wait more than 24 hours for a hospital bed.

"Over the last week the hospital system has been struggling to cope," said Prof Geelhoed.

"We have seen serious levels of ramping, with more than half the ambulance fleet tied up outside emergency departments.

"Most elective surgery has been cancelled because of the bed shortage and there's even been a lack of Intensive Care beds with hospitals having great difficulty admitting new intubated patients."

Prof Geelhoed said Health Minister Dr Kim Hames had recognised the problem by introducing the "four-hour rule" for emergency departments earlier this year, but it would be almost two years before it had an impact on overcrowding.

"The Government must also understand that the four-hour rule alone will not solve the problem," he said.

"Until we get about 400 more beds, more nurses and more resources, the hospital system in WA will never be able to provide the standard of patient care that the community deserves."

Prof Geelhoed said that the Government had also failed to address the problem of obsolete and faulty equipment which was hindering the clinical operations of most hospitals.

"The danger is that unless our hospitals can perform better, the Federal Government could have the excuse to take them over – and that would be a disaster, in our view."

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