Victorian pilot program helps alleviate pressure on hospital beds

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Australia's ageing population is one of the most difficult challenges faced by hospitals. Emergency visits by the elderly are increasing, with over 65's making up almost half the people occupying hospital beds around the country. Some hospitals are taking a new approach to the problem which is both improving care for the elderly and freeing up hospital beds for others.

Transcript

00:00It's a busy morning at St Vincent's emergency department in Melbourne and many of the patients

00:07are elderly. This man was brought in after blacking out on the street.

00:11Have you had other falls in the past? Geriatrician Richard Kane is doing the rounds of the older

00:18patients. Being in hospital for an older person is a more risky experience than being in their

00:23own homes in many ways. Beverly Minogue's knee gave out last month and she was unable to climb

00:28the stairs to her bedroom. I've got osteoarthritis that's bone on bone. When the 85 year old went to

00:34emergency she was expecting a lengthy hospital stay but thanks to a new program which embeds a

00:40geriatrician in the emergency department she went home the next day with daily visits from nurses

00:45and specialists instead. I think it's wonderful you don't have to be stuck in the hospital and

00:51not be able to sleep. We find that people recover more quickly in their own environment. Hospital

00:57data shows that more than 100 older patients have been diverted from wards like this one

01:02to either home, rehabilitation or aged care over a one year period and more than 900 days of in-hospital

01:10care have been avoided. On any given day three or four patient beds are available for other patients

01:16upstairs. Programs like this are increasing as the number of hospital beds per 1,000 people aged over

01:2265 declines, halving in the last 30 years. The peak doctors group says any incoming federal government

01:29must prioritize a new longer-term funding agreement for hospitals. We also want to make sure that that

01:34funding drives the kind of care that we want and that our elderly Australians need. Labor has endorsed

01:41an increase in federal funding but not yet brokered a new agreement. The coalition says it would negotiate

01:46a new agreement as a matter of urgency.

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