The Northern Territory's Health Department has declared a "code yellow" at Katherine Hospital amid a surge of patients coming into its emergency department.
The 60-bed facility serves the town of Katherine, three hours south of Darwin, as well as remote communities.
In a statement released on Thursday afternoon, NT Health said the decision to declare a code yellow was taken because of an "increase in patients who require emergency care".
It said the measure would allow Katherine Hospital to enact "a number of practices" to help ease pressure on its emergency department, adding that patient safety was a priority.
This is the second time in four months that such a declaration has been made for Katherine Hospital.
In August, a code yellow was issued there — as well as the Royal Darwin Hospital and Palmerston Regional Hospital — after a warehouse fire that destroyed $30 million worth of medical equipment.
The Royal Darwin also had a code yellow declared in February to manage overcrowding in multiple sections of the hospital.
Sign of health system under pressure
Katherine's health system is under significant strain, with general practitioner clinics, in particular, only offering limited services between now and the new year.
The town of 11,000 people has struggled in recent years to attract and retain GPs and other health services.
Concerns have also been raised about how the hospital would cope with increased demand from patients.
Dr Thomas Fowles — who is the president of the Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation NT branch — said he had written to the management of Katherine Hospital on Thursday, outlining concerns about doctors being overworked at the facility, before the code yellow was put in place.
"The staff at Katherine Hospital have been under-resourced for some time," he said.
Dr Fowles said a code yellow declaration shifted the healthcare system towards "disaster management mode".
"Patients are discharged earlier than planned, surgeries are cancelled, emergency patients sit in the waiting room for hours," he said.
It is the second code yellow to be declared over a Northern Territory hospital in just over a month, after Gove Hospital suffered a "network outage" in early October.
