Patient compo path as hospitals start to buckle

PATIENTS taken to Gold Coast public hospitals by ambulance are waiting more than seven hours for treatment – and a lawyer says it is only a matter of time before they start suing the state government for compensation.

The crisis has become so bad it is claimed exhausted paramedics have been sleeping at stations and been stood down due to fatigue as they spend hours waiting to offload patients.

“So the longest wait times here on the Gold Coast over the last six months at Gold Coast University Hospital is between seven and 7½ hours,” opposition spokeswoman for health and ambulance services Ros Bates said.

“And here at Robina it’s increasing, where it’s between 5½ and seven hours.”

The Mudgeeraba MP rubbished government claims the bottlenecks were the result of Covid: “We know that Queensland Health was in crisis long before Covid.”

Gold Coast compensation lawyer Bruce Simmonds suggested the government could find itself facing lawsuits due to worsening ambulance ramping.

“I can’t imagine the frustration and discomfort a patient would experience enduring such a long wait,” Mr Simmonds said.

“When we call for an ambulance there’s an expectation it will be dispatched promptly.”

Paramedics were stretched by the fourth-highest volume of triple-0 calls in Queensland history this week, amid Covid-19 hospitalisations being at their highest number since the second wave of the Omicron variant.

Ms Bates said Coast patients had been waiting for treatment well in excess of the 30-minute clinically recommended timeframe.

She said there was “no room” for sick patients in hospitals “and no plan to fix our ramping crisis”.

“It means that a paramedic can’t get out when your child is having an asthma attack, your father is having a heart attack or your grandmother has fallen over,” Ms Bates said.

She said she felt “so sorry” for healthcare workers on the Gold Coast.

“This government needs to come up with solutions now and stop blaming Covid for everything,” Ms Bates said.

Asked what solutions the LNP could suggest, Ms Bates pointed to “real-time data monitoring so that GPS and patients know exactly how busy the ramps are at our hospitals”.

“You can do that right now in NSW. I can look over the border and look at Tweed Heads Hospital and see how many ambulances are ramped,” she said.

“We want to make sure we have more nurses trained up for triage.

“We also want to give back the power of running hospitals to the people who actually know the system and know how to run them – and that’s the nurses, doctors and paramedics.”

Ms Bates said the Coast needed hundreds more hospital beds and an 800-bed hospital at the city’s northern end.

“Gold Coast University (Hospital) is the busiest ED in the country, seeing on average about 420 cases a day. They are absolutely overwhelmed,” she said.

A Gold Coast Health spokesperson said emergency departments could experience “surges”.

“For example, (on Monday) we saw more than 380 patients, including many arriving by ambulance,” they said.

“At one stage during the day, we had 24 ambulances arrive in an hour.

“Our staff continue to work hard to provide the best care to the Gold Coast community.”

On Tuesday, Health Minister Yvette D’ath said the volume of Queenslanders calling ambulances was “quite unprecedented” and Queensland had not been “getting our fair share from Canberra”.

Ms D’ath’s office was asked to respond specifically to Ms Bates’ and Mr Simmonds’ concerns, but instead pointed to a livestreamed press conference.