STAFF at Bendigo Health are making changes they hope will help free up hospital beds and expand at-home care services.<\/p>\n
The effort is a result of a 25 per cent increase in ED presentations and a 10 per cent rise in hospital admissions during the last five years.<\/p>\n
CEO Peter Faulkner said while resources were stretched at times during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, that isn\u2019t the case anymore.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur resources are pretty good,\u201d said he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no doubt that COVID has seen some deferral of care, and that\u2019s resulted in people becoming more ill when they\u2019re at home, and then when they are presenting, needing more intervention.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Faulkner said Bendigo\u2019s ageing demographic is one of many factors likely to have caused the increase in patient numbers.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday we\u2019ve got every bed that we can have open, open,\u201d said Mr Faulkner. \u201cWe have an ageing population, and while we\u2019re living longer, we\u2019re not necessarily living healthier.<\/p>\n
\u201cBendigo has experienced population growth, and that brings with it increased demand.\u201d<\/p>\n
Acting director of nursing and medical services Penny Spencer said Bendigo Health staff are trying to improve patient flow within the hospital.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve increased our scope of service, so we\u2019re putting more resources in to take on more patients in community-based care,\u201d said Ms Spencer.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve increased the service to include rehab in the home, and we\u2019ve increased the amount of patients that can be seen at home.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re getting between 25-35 admissions every day, so for us to utilise our hospital beds well, we have to have at least 35 discharges each day.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe try and focus on how we can influence the back door, because we can\u2019t influence how many people are coming into ED, but we can try and improve the patient discharging.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
STAFF at Bendigo Health are making changes they hope will help free up hospital beds and expand at-home care services. The effort is a result of a 25 per cent increase in ED presentations and a 10 per cent rise in hospital admissions during the last five years. CEO Peter Faulkner said while resources were […]<\/p>\n