Royal Adelaide Hospital assaults and overcrowded emergency department leave staff on edge
Another night, another horror show in the Royal Adelaide Hospital emergency department. And medical unions say it’s leaving staff at breaking point.
SA News
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Royal Adelaide Hospital emergency clinicians have endured yet another horror night with the emergency department operating at or above capacity since 2pm on Wednesday.
Calls are growing for increased security teams and a separate ED for mental health patients after a series of assaults on staff, the latest on Tuesday night leaving a doctor needing plastic surgery for gashed ear, a nurse suffering shoulder injuries and a security guard knocked out.
Patients as well as staff were traumatised by the alleged assaults. Patients who witnessed the melee have been given counselling to deal with the mental shock while they were receiving treatment for physical problems.
Sad and angry - shocking decisions over many years and not listening. @sahealth
— SASMOA (@sasmoa4doctors) July 3, 2024
State and Federal Governments, Premiers and Prime Ministers, Health Boards and Bureaucracy need to take a long hard look at themselves in the mirror - the buck stops with you. pic.twitter.com/Jn4lrDHH4e
The patient allegedly went behind a desk and threw a printer, and used a metal water bottle as a weapon to hit staff.
A 23-year-old woman from Kensington has been charged with three counts of assault.
The Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF) is calling for a doubling of security teams at the ED, and for a separate ED for mental health patients.
RAH clinicians have been under relentless stress for weeks and it is taking such a toll a welfare inspection by the SA Salaried Medical Officers Association (SASMOA) saw a doctor sum up the situation by saying: “Staff are f***ing broken.”
The subsequent SASMOA report to SafeWork SA prompted an investigation by their inspectors resulting in an intervention order to improve the situation which is causing a risk of psychological harm to staff by Tuesday or face a $250,000 fine.
SafeWork officers have returned to the RAH to see how management are trying improve the situation, however demand continues to overwhelm staff.
Over Wednesday night, ED clinicians were constantly treating more patients than its capacity, at times treating more than 80 people in its 69-capacity ED, with more than 30 people waiting to be seen.
By 8am on Thursday, there were 77 people listed as being treated but 50 of these were waiting for an appropriate bed including 10 waiting more than 24 hours.
Tuesday night’s rampage follows a nurse being bashed around the head by a mental health patient in the ED last Thursday night, an aggressive mental health patient who broke through security doors and trapped staff in a tearoom until the patient could be restrained last week, and an attack on a male clinician last month.
ANMF state secretary Elizabeth Dabars said nurses and patients were traumatised by the attacks.
“It’s like being in a war zone – it’s not fair on patients or staff but it is also not fair on mental health patients being treated for days on end in environments not conducive to their care and recovery,” she said.
Ms Dabars has met with staff and management and is calling for immediate action including an additional security team.
“They currently have one group of five who are available on shift ant any time, we are advocating and certainly believe they need to have a second full security team of five available at every shift,” she said.
“We are pleased to see management act to secure some additional duress alarms but none of this fixes the ultimate problem. All of these measure are simply a Band-Air solution to a bigger issue which is the lack of available mental health beds, lack of available mental health staff and lack of available community health services.”
The upgraded Queen Elizabeth Hospital includes a four-bed assessment area to separately provide a safe environment for mental health patients who require extended assessment and treatment.
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