Access to public hospitals : measuring performance

Timely access to care is important. For patients requiring emergency care, as well as those waiting for elective surgery, the time taken to receive services can significantly affect clinical outcomes.

A key objective for the Department of Human Services (DHS) is ‘timely and accessible human (health) services’. DHS measures this aspect of hospital performance using 12 access indicators. These measure access to emergency care and to elective surgery.

The audit objective was to determine whether reported access indicators are relevant, appropriate and fairly represent hospital performance.

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