Patients seeking treatment at Hunter emergency departments faced waits of up to four hours when arriving by ambulance this week, paramedics say. Login or signup to continue reading They say this problem - known as ambulance ramping - is worsening. The latest Bureau of Health Information data - released this week for the January to March quarter - confirms this.
Only 71.1 per cent of patients were transferred from paramedics to emergency department staff at hospitals in the district within 30 minutes, the lowest on record. At John Hunter Hospital, this figure was 62.
5 per cent - also the lowest on record. Brendan McIlveen, a Newcastle-based paramedic , said there were "major delays" for paramedics getting patients into Hunter hospitals. Mr McIlveen, an Australian Paramedics Association NSW assistant secretary, said this problem had been "horrendous every single day" over the past week.
"There were times when there were 16 ambulances waiting at John Hunter. I know of at least eight at Maitland at any one time," he said. "That's related to the change in the weather, the new flu strain that's kicking in and COVID has kicked in again.
" He said the "overarching issue" was that "people can't get access to GPs". "The next quarter's results will be interesting. That will reflect this week's situation," he said.
The latest data showed one in 10 patients waited in an ambulance for longer than one hour and 21 minutes, before being transferred to emergency in Hunter New England hospitals .
