The ACT's emergency departments are still among the worst in the country for treatment times, with patients facing the equal longest wait times to be seen.
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In the ACT, the median wait time in emergency rooms (the time it takes to see 50 per cent of patients) was 30 minutes in 2016-17, equal worst with the Northern Territory, according to data released by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare on Wednesday. The ACT figure was well above the national median of 19 minutes, and more than twice as long as NSW, where the median wait time was 14 minutes.
NInety per cent of patients in Canberra were seen within 116 minutes of arrival, a wait also among the worst in the country. In NSW, 90 per cent of patients were seen within 76 minutes and the national average was 95 minutes.
The data showed 62 per cent of the ACT's patients were seen on time, just above worst performing jurisdiction, the Northern Territory, which treated 61 per cent of patients on time and well below the national rate of 73 per cent.
Only half of category three urgent patients were seen on time, the equal worst in the country. Urgent cases are supposed to be seen within 30 minutes of arrival. For non-urgent cases, the recommended time is within two hours. Ninety-one per cent of non-urgent patients in Canberra were seen on time.
The ACT was also the only jurisdiction to fail to treat 100 per cent of resuscitation patients on time.
But ACT Health has previously denied any resuscitation patients were left waiting, attributing the below par figure to delays in filling out paper work.
The territory submitted data this year to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare for the first time since 2015, allowing its emergency departments to be compared on a national level.
Data quality issues that have plagued ACT Health in recent years meant no data was provided in 2016 due to concerns over accuracy.
The data shows average wait times for the ACT have improved from 2015-16 when median wait time blew out to 37 minutes.
ACT's emergency departments are under increasing pressure, with 143,860 presentations, up from 129,961 in 2014/15, representing a 4.9 per cent increase since 2012/13, the biggest in the country.
"Between 2012–13 and 2016–17, after adjusting for the number of hospitals included, presentations to emergency departments increased by 2.6 per cent each year on average," health institute spokesperson Jenny Hargreaves said.
Injuries and poisonings were the biggest cause for presentations at the ACT's emergency departments at 39,719.
But while more patients are attending emergency departments, their length of stay has steadily decreased.
Patients in the ACT now stay on average three hours and 58 minutes, down from 6 hours and three minutes five years ago.
The report shows that in 2016–17, there were 7.8 million presentations to public hospital emergency departments across Australia - or more than 21,000 each day.
The proportion of people presenting to emergency departments who were seen "on time" for their urgency (triage) category was fairly stable across the period, ranging from 73 per cent (in 2012–13 and 2016–17) to 75 per cent (in 2013–14).
In 2016–17, patients aged four and under - who make up less than seven per cent of the Australian population - accounted for 11 per cent of all emergency department presentations.
"Patients aged 65 and over - 15 per cent of the population - accounted for more than 21 per cent of emergency department presentations", Ms Hargreaves said.
About one-quarter—or almost two million—emergency department presentations were for injuries or poisoning.
