THE State Opposition has pointed to statistics showing ramped patients at Ipswich Hospital are waiting longer for treatment under the Crisafulli Government.
Shadow Health Minister Mark Bailey said new data showed the rate of patients being taken off ambulance stretchers on to an Emergency Department bed at Ipswich Hospital in under 30 minutes had plunged in the months since the Crisafulli Government came to power.
The number taken into Emergency within 30 minutes (Patient Off Stretcher Time) has gone from 42 per cent in November 2024 to 33.5 per cent in May.
“Why are Ipswich patients being neglected by the Crisafulli Government, who promised to improve health services,” Mr Bailey said.
But a spokeswoman for Health and Ambulance Services Minister Tim Nicholls said the Crisafulli Government’s Hospital Rescue Plan was saving Ipswich and the West Moreton region after a decade of Labor inaction left local health services in crisis.
“As part of our $18.5 billion Hospital Rescue Plan, work is well underway on the Ipswich Hospital Expansion, which will deliver 200 new overnight beds, a new Emergency Department, operating theatres, an expanded coronary care unit and a multi-storey car park,” Mr Nicholls said. “We are also investing $638 million over four years to deliver public healthcare services at Mater Hospital Springfield when it opens in 2026.”
The hospital will include 174 new overnight beds, an Emergency Department, operating theatres, an intensive care ward and maternity and paediatric care, with an additional 12 paediatric beds.
“West Moreton is one of the fastest-growing regions in Queensland, which is why we’re also expanding the Ripley Satellite Health Centre to include 90 new beds, more services like rehabilitation and palliative care, and more parking,” Mr Nicholls said.
But State Member for Ipswich West Wendy Bourne said Queenslanders deserved better than a government which “treated healthcare like a business deal and patients like numbers”.
“With patients being left longer on stretchers at Ipswich Hospital and the Government’s new directive that if patients stay in an emergency department longer than 24 hours the hospital gets its funding cut, the Government can expect more of this to happen.”
