AN overflowing ambulance bay outside John Hunter Hospital on Thursday offers insight into the healthcare "crisis" happening beyond the emergency department (ED) doors, staff unions say.
It comes as NSW paramedics - tired of apologising for attending to patients "hours late" - prepare to escalate industrial action from Monday due to resourcing and wage concerns.
"Emergency healthcare is in crisis, and it is patients and paramedics who have been paying the price," Australian Paramedic Association NSW's Scott Beaton said. Current workloads and conditions were "wildly unsustainable", and the service was in "perpetual crisis".
The industrial action follows the death of a Lake Macquarie woman who waited seven hours for an ambulance on April 29 and died 10 minutes after being admitted to Belmont Hospital.
Paramedics want a commitment of 1500 extra staff to address workload and ease worsening bed block.
Rachel Hughes, secretary of the John Hunter Hospital branch of the NSW Nurses and Midwives Association, said the ambulance bay was overflowing regularly, with vehicles forced to park on the road and in no stopping areas while they waited to offload patients.
She said there was pressure on paramedics to offload, pressure on the "in-charge" in ED to find a bed, and pressure on the bed manager to make space for the new patients.
"That puts pressure on the nurses in triage who have all these people in the waiting room wanting to be treated," she said. "It's so much pressure on everyone, something is going to break, something has to give. It's scary."
From Monday, paramedics will not input patient billing information on internal electronic medical records, making it harder for NSW Health to send patients an ambulance bill.
Union members would also refuse "staff movements", which would relocate them to another station once on shift.
"Hopefully whoever our new federal minister for health is hurries up and makes some changes, because we need help, and we need it now," Ms Hughes said. "It's frustrating for us, it's frustrating for the paramedics, and frustrating for the patients."
