WA Labor is Still Holding Back Our Hospital
Federal Member for Moore, Ian Goodenough MP, is calling on WA Labor to urgently deliver on its 2017 election commitment to expand Joondalup Health Campus, so it has the capacity to treat patients presenting to the Emergency Department in a reasonable timeframe.
St John Paramedics have continually expressed their frustration, raising their concerns with Mr Goodenough, stating there will be a catastrophic event sooner or later, in which “someone will die”.
St John Paramedic Dave said, “I am continuingly frustrated at being unable to access Joondalup Health Campus entrance with cars backed up trying to get into the carpark this morning, while entering on a priority 1 (lights and sirens).”
“I was unnecessarily delayed due to the tailback; security staff were having to try clear the congestion. This did not help my critically ill patient. I have seen mothers stuck in the queue running down the road into the department carrying sick babies as they couldn't wait in line any longer.” he said.
The WA Emergency Access Target requires that 90 per cent of all patients presenting to a public hospital emergency department be seen and admitted, transferred, or discharged within four hours.
In June, only 57 per cent of emergency department patients at Joondalup Health Campus were seen within four hours.
The strain on the Joondalup Emergency Department resources has led to unacceptable levels of ambulance ramping at our hospital.
According to St John WA, hospitals aim to receive all patients within 30 minutes of ambulances arriving at the emergency department. Any additional time spent parked outside the hospital waiting to handover a patient is referred to as ramping and recorded in hours.
In the past week, ambulances have spent an additional 174 hours parked outside the hospital therefore delaying their response times to emergencies within our community. Since the start of July, there have been 591.5 hours ramped at Joondalup Health Campus.
In 2017 in the lead up to the State election, WA Labor promised $167 million towards a $325 million expansion of the Health Campus. In 2019, this figure was cut to $98.7 million, resulting in a 41% decrease.
In 2018 the Federal Government delivered it’s $158 million contribution to the planned expansion, however this money is still languishing in State coffers.
“WA Labor’s failure to deliver these additional resources is continuing to have a significant impact on the time taken to treat patients presenting to Joondalup’s Emergency Department.” Mr Goodenough said.
“Joondalup Health Campus is the only major hospital servicing Perth’s northern corridor and given current population growth of 70,000 new residents by 2030, this problem is only going to get worse.”
