Disability service provider 'deeply saddened' after client died while waiting for an ambulance
ABC News 5 Jan 2024
The man, whose identity has been revealed as Eddie, died in Hectorville on December 27, during an evening of "significant" ambulance ramping across all Adelaide metropolitan hospitals, according to the ambulance union.
On Thursday, the Ambulance Employees Association said the 54-year-old called triple-0 with abdominal pain and vomiting, and was initially triaged as an "Urgent Priority 5" case.
SA Ambulance said when his condition deteriorated, the case was updated to a Priority 1 and crews arrived within 4 minutes.
By the time paramedics arrived he had died.
Lighthouse Disability says it is "deeply saddened" by Eddie's death.
In a statement, Lighthouse Disability said it was "deeply saddened" by his passing and would not be making any further comment.
SA Ambulance Service chief executive Rob Elliott said on Thursday that his organisation would undertake a review to understand the circumstances of the case.
SA Health chief executive Robyn Lawrence told ABC Radio Adelaide it was "very busy" across the health system that evening, with a high volume of triple-0 calls.
Robyn Lawrence says December was a busy month for the health system.
"Because of the high volume of calls and transports to hospitals, our hospitals in the post-Christmas period were exceedingly busy also on that particular day … ambulances were being ramped," Dr Lawrence said.
Dr Lawrence said there was a 6 per cent increase in ambulances attending hospital in December, and an increase in the proportion of patients who attended the emergency departments being admitted to hospital.
"Those patients who attended the emergency department during that period were sicker than in previous months," she said.
Flowers were left outside Eddie's home.
"We are seeing increasing demand on our services by people who are sicker, we are seeing more delays in people being able to exit hospitals due to factors which are beyond our control."
Opposition Leader David Speirs said the Health Minister Chris Picton should resign.
"Chris Picton has had too many chances from this premier. It's time that Peter Malinauskas came back to Adelaide, fronted up, spoke to South Australians about why he keeps on breaking his promises around healthcare," Mr Speirs said.
Opposition health spokesperson Ashton Hurn said the premier needed to explain why ramping had worsened in South Australia.
"We saw during the election that Peter Malinauskas was doing almost daily media on ramping, but today as the health system is on its knees, he's completely missing in action," Ms Hurn said.
"He needs to be showing leadership now and that means fronting up, being here and explaining to South Australians what on earth is happening in our health system.
"When you hang your hat solely on a promise to fix ramping, you've got to actually deliver and far from delivering they've actually made it worse."
Premier Peter Malinauskas said additional resources would be rolled out to try and address the ramping issue in 2024.
Premier Peter Malinauskas said his thoughts were with Eddie and his loved ones.
"[He] in many respects is a victim of the ramping crisis, which is what we seek to address as a government," he said.
"There is a lot of work to be done."
Mr Malinauskas said efforts were underway to reach out to Eddie's family through his care provider.
The premier said the government had a "clear plan" to roll out additional resources to ease the pressure on the hospital system in 2024.
"We're going to start to see the fruits of the investment decisions we made in our first state budget," he said.
He also refuted the opposition's claims he had been "missing in action", and knocked back calls for Mr Picton to resign.
"This is not the first time [the opposition has] made these calls," he said.
"I think it's a demonstration they don't have ideas of their own and they're more focused on playing politics
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Man Died Waiting 10 Hours For Ambulance (Read 377 times)
