Respiratory illnesses continued to circulate in the community, resulting in an increase in complex presentations to emergency departments (EDs) and admissions to our hospitals.
At Deniliquin Hospital specifically, there were 2,608 emergency department (ED) attendances in the July to September 2022 quarter.
Almost all patients (96.2 per cent) started treatment on time, which is significantly better than the average for hospitals of a similar size in NSW (76.6 per cent).
Almost all patients (91.9 per cent) were transferred from ambulance to ED staff within the 30 minute benchmark time.
The vast majority of patients (83.7 per cent) were able to leave the ED within four hours – also better than the average for comparable hospitals in NSW (78.7 per cent).
During the same quarter, Deniliquin Health Service completed 46 elective surgeries and 12 babies were born.
MLHD Chief Executive Ms Jill Ludford thanked all MLHD staff for their hard work throughout this period of high activity.
“Following on from the peak of the Omicron outbreak, the onset of winter brought further challenges, impacting our communities and our workforce,” Ms Ludford said.
“Despite this, our emergency departments continued to provide care within timeframes well above the state average, and our ambulance transfer of care times are among the best in the state for this quarter.
“I thank our highly skilled and dedicated workforce. These results are a testament to their hard work.”
MLHD is working hard to reduce elective surgery wait times, which have been impacted by necessary pauses on non-urgent procedures throughout the pandemic.
Thre were 1,940 elective surgeries completed across the MLHD region in the July to September quarter, with all urgent elective surgeries performed on time.
MLHD continues its surgical recovery plan, with 187 more elective procedures performed in July to September than in the preceding April to June quarter (1,753).
“I thank the community for their patience during this challenging time and can assure everyone our District is continuing to work hard to carry out those procedures that were postponed during the COVID waves,” Ms Ludford said.
“Patients due to receive non-urgent elective surgery who have been impacted by the restrictions are encouraged to seek medical attention should they experience a change in their condition so they can be clinically reviewed and re-prioritised to a more urgent category if required.”
The 2022-23 budget for Murrumbidgee Local Health District is nearly $728 million, an increase of more than $29 million - or 4.2 per cent more on the previous year’s budget.
Between mid-2012 and mid-2022, MLHD increased its workforce by an additional 680 full-time equivalent staff - an increase of 24.9 per cent including 64 more doctors, 326 more nurses and midwives and 111 more allied health staff.
