Emergency Department presentations
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Time of emergency department presentations
The timing of humanitarian entrants presenting to emergency departments was consistent across the last 5 financial years, 2016–17 to 2020–21. In 2020–21 humanitarian entrants were most likely to present to emergency departments (ED) between the hours of 10 am and 10 pm, with Monday the day of the week with the highest proportion of presentations (15.1%) (Figure 6). Monday was also the day with a higher proportion of ED presentations for the general Australian population in 2020–21. Compared with the general Australia population, humanitarian entrants had slightly higher proportions of ED presentations from 10 pm to 3:59 am and lower proportions from 6 am to 10 am (AIHW 2021).
Further data on time of ED presentations including for other permanent migrants, and further financial years in the Data tables.
Figure 6. Proportion of emergency department presentations on each weekday by time of day, in humanitarian entrants, 2020–21
Heat map showing the proportion of ED presentations that occur at time of day and day of the week, darker colours from 10 am to 9:59 pm show more ED presentations within these hours. The pattern is consistent across all days of the week.
Notes:
- This does not include emergency department presentations which occurred in WA or NT or for people living in WA or NT in 2020–21.
Mode of arrival to emergency departments
The mode of arrival relates to how a patient arrives at the ED, whether by ambulance which includes air ambulance and helicopter rescue), or another form of transport.
Between 2016–17 and 2020–21, a higher proportion of humanitarian entrants arrived to an ED via ambulance compared with other permanent migrants and the general Australian population. (AIHW 2021) (Table 2).
Financial year | Humanitarian entrants | Other permanent migrants | General Australian population |
|---|---|---|---|
2016–17 | 24.9% | 13.6% | 25.4% |
2020–21 | 28.5% | 15.6% | 27.4% |
Source: Refugee health linked data set for humanitarian entrants and other permanent migrants, AIHW Australian hospital statistics for general Australian population.
Note:
- This analysis excludes people who lived in WA or NT or had ED presentations in WA or NT.
Emergency department presentations for lower urgency care
Around 1 in 3 ED presentations in humanitarian entrants (32%) were classified as lower urgency care in 2020–21.
Lower urgency ED presentations are defined as presentations at formal public hospital EDs where the person:
- had a Type of visit to the ED of Emergency presentation, and
- had a triage category of semi-urgent (triage category 4: should be seen within 60 minutes) or non-urgent care (category 5: should be seen within 120 minutes), and
- did not arrive by ambulance, or police or correctional vehicle, and
- was not admitted to the hospital, was not referred to another hospital, and did not die.
Humanitarian entrants had higher rates of lower urgency ED presentations per 1,000 people (92 presentations per 1,000 people) but had a lower proportion of the total ED presentations that were classified as lower urgency (32%) than other permanent migrants (66 presentations per 1,000 people and 42%, respectively) (Figure 7).
For humanitarian entrants the rate of lower urgency ED presentations decreased from 112 per 1,000 people in 2016–17 to 92 per 1,000 people in 2020–21. This pattern was not seen in other permanent migrants (see Figure 7 and the Data tables for more detail).
Figure 7: Proportion of total ED presentations that were classified as lower urgency and crude rate of lower urgency ED presentations per 1,000 people, by cohort, 2016–17 to 2020–21
The graph shows the proportion of ED presentations that were classified as lower urgency care in a column graph, and the rate of lower urgency care ED presentations per 1,000 people in a line graph, from 2016–17 to 2020–21. The proportion is consistently lower and the rate is consistently higher in humanitarian entrants compared with other permanent migrants.
Notes:
- This does not include emergency department presentations which occurred in WA or NT or for people living in WA or NT.
Between 2016–17 and 2020–21, among humanitarian entrants, of ED presentations classified as lower urgency varied by age group:
- Close to a quarter (26%) of all lower urgency ED presentations (25,006 presentations) were for people aged under 20, compared with only 16.9% of all ED presentations
- Children under 10 represented 8.6% (8,193 presentations) of all lower urgency ED presentations, compared with 4.4% of total ED presentations, and had the highest presentation rate (129 per 1,000 people)
- Conversely, people aged 60 and over accounted for 5.4% of lower urgency ED presentations (5,131 presentations, at a rate of 66 per 1,000 people), compared with 11.2% of total ED presentations.
The patterns seen for lower urgency ED presentations in humanitarian entrants reflect the patterns seen for the general Australian population (AIHW 2024). In 2020–21, the overall proportion of ED presentations that were classified as lower urgency was lower in the humanitarian entrant population than the general Australian population (32% compared with 36% respectively). Both cohorts also had younger age groups with higher rates of lower urgency ED presentations and lower rates in older age groups.
AIHW (2021) Emergency department care 2020–21: Australian hospital statistics, AIHW website, accessed 05 June 2024.
AIHW (2024) Use of emergency departments for lower urgency care, AIHW, Australian Government, accessed 05 June 2024.