Wellington Hospital’s Emergency Department had its busiest day for almost a year on Monday, seeing a total of 258 patients.<\/p>\n
Health NZ said this compared with an average of 189 a day last month.<\/p>\n
But it added as a caveat that the data was operational and was subject to change following a a quality assurance process.<\/p>\n
The agency said there had been high demand over the last few days and some staff sickness.<\/p>\n
Robert Blaikie, interim deputy group director of operations, said winter was a busy time for healthcare providers.<\/p>\n
“Despite these pressures, our dedicated staff continued to provide safe, compassionate and professional care in extremely difficult circumstances. I would like to thank them for their dedication and professionalism.”<\/p>\n
He said staff had increased temporary capacity and frequently reviewed patients to see if they might be discharged sooner.<\/p>\n
He said preparations for winter had been underway since March, including more staff, beds and community care.<\/p>\n
The capital’s urgent care clinic’s opening hours are being extended to give patients alternative options.<\/p>\n
A specialised elderly care nurse will support earlier discharge for senior patients in the Hutt Valley.<\/p>\n
A nurse will be introduced to a pharmacy in Porirua and four in the Hutt Valley.<\/p>\n
Health NZ advised the public to get their flu and whooping cough jabs to protect themsleves and the wider community.<\/p>\n
It encouraged people to consider other options for care, including Healthline, local GPs and pharmacies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wellington Hospital’s Emergency Department had its busiest day for almost a year on Monday, seeing a total of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":565463,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[134,527,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-565462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=565462"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565462\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/565463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=565462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=565462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=565462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}