10 January 2020 - A critical shortage of mental health beds and unaffordable dental­ services are prompting increasin­g numbers of patients to flood emergency departments and be admitted for preventable surger­y, as evidence grows that public hospitals are under unsustainable strain.

The Australasian College of Emergency Medicine says some mental health patients wait as long as three days in emergency for a bed to become available in a ward.

“Greater than 24-hour stays would be daily occurrences in many emergency departments around the country,” said ACEM president John Bonning. “Some of these patients can spend two or three days waiting for a bed.

Read The Australian article