Northern and North West EDs in a Critical Condition

The Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF) Tasmanian Branch will meet with senior management at the North-West Regional Hospital (NWRH) to discuss urgent strategies to support an overwhelmed and under-resourced Emergency Department.

ANMF Tasmanian Branch Secretary Emily Shepherd said the ANMF will also represent Launceston General Hospital Emergency Department members before the Tasmanian Industrial Commission following a dispute related to similar issues.

“The ANMF understands it has become commonplace for the triage nurse at the NWRH to look after 11 patients in the waiting room who are receiving treatment with up to 10 patients waiting to be seen, whilst also needing to manage and triage patients who walk in or arrive by ambulance,” Ms Shepherd said.

“These untenable workloads are sustained and despite the Tasmanian Health Service writing to the Tasmanian Industrial Commission stating that they had presented a number of proposed solutions in good faith and in an effort to work collaboratively with the ANMF, these proposals have not been funded or implemented.

“It is unfathomable that one nurse would be left to care for over 21 patients, the majority of whom are undiagnosed and unstable.

“Anyone who actually understands risk in delivering health services would be unwilling to allow that level of risk to remain unmitigated, not only for the staff, but importantly for patient care.”

Ms Shepherd said the ANMF has requested to meet with senior management today at the NWRH at midday to discuss actual tangible solutions to manage the unmitigated risks within the NWRH ED.

“Only weeks ago, a discussion occurred with respect to the NWRH ED potentially going on bypass due to having over 40 patients within the department.

“Despite these ongoing capacity concerns, our members are not even being provided with enough nursing staff to deliver care to these patients, even if there is no appropriate space to do so.”

Meanwhile, the ANMF will return to the Tasmanian Industrial Commission at 3pm today to again represent members at the LGH ED who have also been dealing with ongoing sustained unreasonable workloads.

“Members also have had the additional pressure of caring for patients who are being offloaded into corridors following the implementation of the Government’s transfer of care procedure, with no additional nursing staff to care for them.

“The ambulance air lock enclosure, that the ANMF advocated for on behalf of members as they were concerned about patients on ambulance trolleys being exposed to the elements while being triaged, is now being used as additional treatment points in the LGH ED.

“Clearly, this is completely inappropriate, and no additional staff have been appointed to care for these patients in a completely separated enclosure.”

Ms Shepherd said the LGH ED has constantly struggled with capacity and while the revised master plan released by the Tasmanian Government is welcomed, as it acknowledges the need for additional capacity with a new sub-acute facility flagged and the additional 250 beds Northern Health Complex being part of the new proposed co-located private hospital, it brings no immediate relief with the timeframe still highlighted as 2031 for the additional 250 beds.

“Our members in the LGH ED need urgent additional resources to deal with ongoing increased capacity.

“The Government’s transfer of care policy means that patients who are presenting by ambulance are given priority over those in the waiting room due to managerial pressure to offload those on ambulance trolleys, even if this wouldn’t have been the clinical decision made without the policy in place.

“Increasing pressure on EDs to accept more and more patients in lesser timeframes does not amount to quicker access to care, it just amounts to patients waiting in corridors on trolleys for the same amount of time they did on the ramp, except the Government hasn’t even provided any nursing staff to care for them.”

Ms Shepherd said what is actually needed is additional capacity urgently.

“The Master Plan works need to be brought forward with work occurring concurrently to implement the whole plan in the North and North-West, while work continues to provide more treatment to patients in their community and homes.

“However, until then, the Government must provide the resources to our members to do their jobs properly and deal with the mess which is the Government’s own making.”