Ambulance ramping persists in Perth despite July 1 ban

Western Australian paramedics are not handing over emergency patients to hospital workers within 30 minutes as required by the state government. The ban on ambulance ramping, effective July 1, covers Fiona Stanley, Royal Perth and Sir Charles Gairdner Hospitals.

To eliminate ramping, Hames ordered hospitals to assign a staff who would take responsibility for ambulance patients 10 minutes after arrival at an emergency department.

WA Health Minister Kim Hames is angry at the three Perth hospitals for failure to curb the practice, reports ABC. In the first month of the policy’s implementation, the three major hospitals ramped ambulances for 370 hours, according to a recent Health Department report.

The 370 hours was just for the three major hospitals. The total hours that ambulances were waiting outside hospital emergency departments reached 1,000 hours in July if all hospitals in WA were included. The ban was broken 26 days out of 30 or 84 percent, according to the Opposition.

The state Opposition used the data as an opportunity to call the policy a failure and seek the resignation of Hames for alleged failure to manage the health portfolio and enforce the ban. Opposition leader Mark McGowan told the minister in Parliament, “It’s time for you to go … you’re half-hearted, you don’t care, you treat it all as a joke.”

Hames admits ramping has not been eliminated but says it has been reduced dramatically. He attributes the 370 hours of ramping in July to the unusually high number of Emergency Department attendances. Hames explains that “When we look at hours of ramping it’s deceptive – when we look at hours of ramping we’ve had over the last week for example, you’ll see at any one time no more than 11 patients are waiting.”

He says WA remains committed to the policy and hospitals would be held accountable for their performance. Australian Medical Association President for WA Michael Gannon took the side of the Opposition, saying, “The problem is that there’s not the capacity in the system to take care of these patients. We’ve been telling the minister this, he’s the one whose got to fix it,” quotes ABC.

Contact the writer at feedback@ibtimes.com.au or tell us what you think below