Surgery is being delivered to Victorians sooner, and wait times continue to fall in emergency departments as more patients using the Allan Labor Government's alternative urgent care options.
The latest quarterly performance data shows that Victoria's emergency departments experienced the highest demand in history, with 504,113 presentations across the state and despite this - patients were seen eight minutes faster than before the pandemic.
Once again, 100 per cent of Category One planned surgery patients were treated in the clinically recommended timeframe - it follows data released last week by the Productivity Commission's Report on Government Services that shows Victoria is the only state or territory to treat all Category One planned surgery patients on time.
Almost 50,000 Victorians underwent planned surgery, with 100 per cent of all Category One patients once again undergoing their procedure within the clinically recommended wait time.
For non-urgent Category Three procedures, patients were seen 31 days quicker than the same time last year, while semi-urgent Category Two patients saw a four-day improvement in treatment time.
Investments to improve surgery wait times continue to contribute to these impressive results, including 23 Patient Support Units at hospitals across the state - helping 4,668 patients avoid surgery and diverting 211 patients to non-surgical treatment pathways in the last quarter.
This includes organising additional investigations, education, outpatient appointments or pre-habilitation while they wait to receive their surgery.
The health system continues to see patients who are sicker and with more complex cases than ever before - more than 60 per cent of presentations to emergency departments required treatment within 30 minutes - this represents an additional 15,000 patients requiring time-sensitive care when compared to the same time last year.
Health services have also improved how quickly they transfer patients from ambulances, with more than 40 per cent of hospitals improving their offloading times this quarter.
Like paramedics across the country, Ambulance Victoria continues to face significant demand with almost 100,000 Code One cases, or around 1,100 lights and sirens cases every day - of these, 64.9 per cent were responded to in 15 minutes.
This is more than 3,000 additional Code 1 incidents than at the same quarter last year - an increase of 1.5 per cent year-to-date on what was Ambulance Victoria's busiest year on record.
The Allan Labor Government's 29 Urgent Care Clinics and Victoria Virtual Emergency Department continue to help ease overall system pressure, treating a combined 1.1 million patients since launching in 2022.
As stated by Minister for Health Mary-Anne Thomas
"Despite facing record demand our dedicated doctors, nurses, midwives and paramedics continue to provide world-class healthcare to Victorians, when and where they need it."
"We're continuing to invest in our hospitals - growing the workforce, delivering more beds and reforming how our health services work together - to reduce pressure on EDs and our paramedics."
