Waiting Times for Emergency Department Care: Proportion Seen on Time
Identifying Attributes
Care Settings
Country
Publishing Organisation
Type of Quality Indicator
IOM Quality Dimension
Domain
Defining Attributes
Definition
The percentage of patients who are treated within national benchmarks for waiting times, for each triage category, in public hospital emergency departments.
Numerator
Number of presentations to public hospital emergency departments that were treated within benchmarks for each triage category: Triage category 1: seen within seconds, calculated as less than or equal to 2 minutes; Triage category 2: seen within 10 minutes; Triage category 3: seen within 30 minutes; Triage category 4: seen within 60 minutes; Triage category 5: seen within 120 minutes.
Denominator
Total presentations to public hospital emergency departments.
Exclusions
Records are excluded from both the numerator and denominator if the episode end status is any of 'Did not wait to be attended by a health care professional', or 'Dead on arrival', or 'Registered, advised of another health care service, and left the emergency department without being attended by a health care professional' or if the waiting time to service is invalid.
Use of Risk Adjustment
Risk Adjustments
None
Stratifications
By triage category, state/territory, peer group, Indigenous status, remoteness and Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) Index of Relative Socio-Economic Disadvantage (IRSD).
Collection and Reporting Attributes
Type of Data Collection
Data Collection Methods
Non-admitted patient emergency department care national minimum data set (NAPEDC NMDS)