Blitz on elective surgery waiting lists

8/9/04
The State Government will spend $8million on an elective surgery waiting list blitz to ensure more than 2,000 extra Western Australians receive their operations by July next year.
Health Minister Jim McGinty said the initiative would target patients who had been waiting longer than clinically desirable for their surgery.
"Many of these people have been waiting patiently for their surgery for many months and in some cases more than a year," Mr McGinty said.
"It is just not acceptable to wait for an operation for so long and that is why we are spending $8million to ensure that people who need their surgery get it sooner, rather than later."
The blitz will target a total of 2,050 additional people requiring operations in the areas of greatest demand including orthopaedic, ear, nose and throat, gynaecological and general surgery.
Much of the surgery will be done at the non-teaching hospitals and the privately run Joondalup and Peel Health Campuses, so patients can have their treatment closer to their homes.
To help cater for the additional surgery, the extra hospital beds which were opened for emergency admissions during the peak winter months will be used for elective surgery patients.
"This is a sensible way of using our precious hospital resources to manage the peaks and troughs of patient demand," the Minister said.
The latest blitz follows on from the $10million elective surgery initiative announced in December last year aimed at patients who had waited for more than 500 days for their treatment.
By June 30, all of the 3,250 people targeted had been offered treatment and had either had their surgery, were scheduled to have their surgery, had had their treatment deferred for clinical reasons or had declined treatment altogether.
As a result, the elective surgery waiting list, which now includes patients at public and privately managed public hospitals, has dropped significantly.
In January this year, there were 18,745 people waiting for elective surgery at public and privately managed public hospitals.
At the end of August, the number of people waiting had dropped by 2,379 to 16,366, with a median waiting time of four-and-a-half months.
If the numbers of elective surgery procedures continue at the current pace, the Department of Health expects the waiting list to have fallen to 14,316 by the end of June next year.
"Although the elective surgery waiting list has reduced significantly this year, there are still too many people waiting longer than they should for their operations," Mr McGinty said.
"This initiative will mean those patients who probably still would have been waiting will be offered a date to have their operation performed before June 30 next year."

The Minister said reducing the elective surgery waiting list had been one of the State Government's top priorities in health, along with easing pressure on public hospital emergency departments.
The Government's strategies were paying dividends, with the waiting list consistently falling and ambulance diversions at emergency departments significantly less than in previous years.
"Thanks to the hard work of the medical staff and the range of initiatives introduced by the State Government, we are seeing our public hospitals coping far better with the ever increasing demands placed upon them," Mr McGinty said.

Proposed elective surgery wait list cases by clinical specialty