PATIENTS at Werribee Mercy Hospital continue to face long waits for treatment in the emergency department, new figures from the Health Department reveal.
According to the Victorian Health Services Performance Report, emergency department patients waited an average of 23 minutes for treatment between April and June this year.
This was up two minutes on the previous quarter and contributed to the hospital’s failure to treat some category two patients on time.
Category two patients are those considered to be suffering a critical illness or in severe pain from heart attacks or severe fractures.
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The state government requires all hospitals to treat 80 per cent of category two patients within 10 minutes. Werribee Mercy treated 78 per cent of patients on time.
The number of mental health patients waiting in the emergency department for more than eight hours also increased. In the June quarter, with 73 mental health patients left waiting for beds, up from 71 between January and March. Only Sunshine Hospital had more patients (115) waiting longer than eight hours for beds.
Mercy Public Hospital’s executive director Linda Mellors said demand for mental health services had increased across the south-west of Melbourne, meaning some patients faced longer stays in the emergency department.
Since April Mercy Mental Health had employed 10 extra community clinicians and one psychiatrist.
Waiting times for emergency department patients being transferred to wards decreased, as did the number of hours spent on ambulance bypass.
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