Ambulances take longer to respond in Bathurst and the Central West

New data from the Bureau of Health Information (BHI) Healthcare Quarterly report showed response times in Bathurst, Dubbo and Orange were longer from October to December 2023 compared with the previous year.

The wait time for Bathurst's highest-priority patients remained unchanged at eight minutes, while emergency patient (the second-highest priority) wait times were up one minute to 13 minutes, and urgent patient (the third-highest priority) wait times were up three minutes to a median of 19 minutes.

Highest priority patients in Dubbo waited an average of eight minutes, a minute longer than the same quarter in 2022, and emergency patients waited 12 minutes, which was the same as the previous year.

Dubbo patients deemed urgent waited two minutes longer than 2022 at 18 minutes.

In Orange, there was no change in wait times for highest-priority patients (eight minutes), nor emergency patients (13 minutes), but patients with urgent cases waited two minutes more than the previous quarter, for a median time of 20 minutes.

Public hospitals in the three Central West cities were on par with the rest of NSW when it came to response times for highest priority patients, and were also on par with the rest of the state for emergency response times.

The Central West fared better than the NSW median wait time for urgent patients, which was 25 minutes.

Hospitals across the Western NSW Local Health District (WNSWLHD) improved in both planned surgery and emergency department (ED) performance during the quarter, despite increasing demand for hospital care.

During the final quarter of 2023, there were 53,608 attendances to the District's EDs, an increase of 3.4 per cent, or 1753 more attendances, compared with the same quarter in 2022.

More than 30,000 presentations were in the semi-urgent (triage four) and non-urgent (triage five) categories, a 5.4 per cent increase in non-urgent presentations compared with the same quarter in 2022.

More than eight in 10 patients (81.5 per cent) started their treatment on time, which is higher than the NSW average (68.3 per cent).

The majority of patients (84 per cent) were transferred from paramedics to ED staff within the 30-minute benchmark, which is better than the NSW average (79.9 per cent), and an improvement of 1.8 percentage points.

Western NSW Local Health District chief executive Mark Spittal thanked staff for their commitment and dedication.

"This report shows our District has improved across a range of key performance measures when compared with the same quarter in 2022, including time to start ED treatment," Mr Spittal said.

"These results are a testament to the hard work of our healthcare workers. I remain incredibly grateful for their commitment and want to thank all of our dedicated staff."