Health Review

Mr MARSHALL (Dunstan—Leader of the Opposition) (14:13): My question is to the Minister for Health. Now that the Noarlunga emergency clinicians have revealed that 20,000 current presentations at the Noarlunga emergency department could not be handled by a walk-in clinic and would have to go to the Flinders Medical Centre, can the minister assure the house that the Flinders Medical Centre could handle a 30 per cent increase in its emergency department presentations?

The SPEAKER: Before I call the Minister for Health, reading Hansard yesterday I noticed that he referred to the opposition as 'galahs' and I would ask him to withdraw and apologise.

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING (Playford—Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Arts, Minister for Health Industries) (14:14): I withdraw and apologise, sir, to the opposition. The presentations to the Noarlunga emergency department are quite clear. Of the presentations to the Noarlunga emergency department, only 13 per cent are admitted to hospital. So, 87 per cent of all the presentations—all the people who come into the Noarlunga emergency department at the moment—do not need to be admitted to hospital. They are not admitted, they are discharged. They are treated and they are discharged. That is not to say that they are not important presentations, they are just not presentations that require an admission into hospital.

Of the 13 per cent who are admitted to hospital, 7 per cent—seven of the 13, so over half of the people who are admitted to hospital—are not admitted to the Noarlunga Hospital, they are admitted to the Flinders Medical Centre, so we are talking about a very, very small number. What happens to those people—what happens to that 7 per cent—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: Double-handled.

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING: As the Treasurer said, they get double-handled. They present to the Noarlunga emergency department, they are assessed, a clinician makes a decision that they need to be transferred, they go up to Flinders emergency department and they go through it all over again, and that is not acceptable treatment. That is a completely unnecessary delay in that person's treatment. Far better for those people, rather than being double-handled and rather than being delayed in the Noarlunga emergency department, that they go straight to the Flinders Medical Centre emergency department where they are going to be treated already.

Of the patients who are admitted from Noarlunga, more than half are admitted into the Flinders Medical Centre and are transferred. The other 6 per cent will be a relatively small number. I think, if I recall, the director of emergency medicine in southern Adelaide estimated about six extra ambulances a day he would expect from patients who would be going straight to Flinders Medical Centre. So about six extra ambulances a day. I am very confident that Flinders Medical Centre is going to be able to deal with those six extra ambulances a day. That is not to say that we still do not have a lot of work to do. Of course we need to make sure that patients are flowing better through all of our emergency departments, and that will be done and that is what we are addressing in these reforms.

Members interjecting:

Mr MARSHALL: Supplementary, sir.

The SPEAKER: Before you ask the supplementary, I call the member for Heysen and the deputy leader to order. The leader.