Waiting time benchmarks planned for Emergency Department

The administration at Mater Dei Hospital is to set benchmarks of waiting time at the Emergency Department according to European levels, Parliamentary Secretary Joseph Cassar announced today.

He was speaking at a press conference with Social Policy Minister John Dalli at the launching of a campaign to discourage people from making use of the E&A Department except for genuine emergencies.

Dr Cassar said the benchmarks would depend on the nature of the emergency, and he pointed out that in the UK, a patient has to be either admitted to hospital or released from the Emergency and Admissions Department within four hours.

Mr Dalli said a culture change was needed because only 20 percent of those calling at the department were genuine emergencies. These people, he said were not receiving the best possible treatment because of the pressures caused by the other 80 percent.

The minister said the government was concentrating on plans to reform and strengthen health centres and to make them a realistic alternative to the hospital Emergency Department. The health centres, he admitted, had a serious shortage of staff. Several health centres also needed additional equipment to serve as alternatives to the hospital.

A suggestion that had been made was for particular health centres to be dedicated for particular emergencies – such as fractures or ophthalmology.

Mr Dalli and Dr Cassar underlined the importance of family doctors and expressed concern that some people viewed them as second class doctors when many of them were actually specialists on general practice.

Dr Cassar said professors Mario Vassallo and Godfrey Laferla have been appointed co-chairman of the E&A Department to look into how the management of the department could be improved, especially from their respective fields of medicine and surgery.