Proposal To Speed Up Patient Care Untested After Two Years
Sydney Morning Herald
Thursday October 11, 2007
PHYSICIANS are unhappy a NSW Health Acute Care Taskforce recommendation made two years ago to help relieve emergency departments has not been implemented despite a positive response by doctors.
The proposal was for physicians to start treating patients while they were waiting for a ward bed - even if that meant attending to them in the corridors of emergency.Yesterday a taskforce member, Christopher Clarke, a visiting thoracic physician at Concord Hospital, said he was disappointed the plan, formed in December 2005, was yet to be implemented."It was the flavour of the month for some time up until several months ago, but it seems to have dropped off the radar," Dr Clarke said.The taskforce's monthly meeting was due on Friday.The Royal Australasian College of Physicians urged the Department of Health to implement the proposal. "Physicians' involvement can be very important in facilitating the patient's management and shortening their stay in hospital," said its president of adult medicine, John Kolbe.A June snapshot survey of emergency departments by the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine, found 40 per cent of the workload was spent caring for patients waiting to be admitted.
© 2007 Sydney Morning Herald
