The wait time for eye surgery is improving with at least 50% of patients now waiting almost 100 days in the public system, but the numbers are the second worst only behind ENT surgeons, according to the latest Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) elective surgery data.
The new statistics also show public hospital admissions for elective surgery were the highest on record in 2023-24, indicating a return to pre-COVID levels of elective surgical activity.
Cataract extraction remains the most common procedure, accounting for 11% of all intended procedures. There were 83,089 cataract surgeries during this period, which is 8.4% more than the 2019-20 period.
Across all surgeries, 50% of all patients were admitted within 46 days in 2023-24, an improvement from 49 days in 2022-23.
This is a key metric in the AIHW statistics. For ophthalmology, 50% of all patients were admitted within 98 days which is double the national average.
Across all surgeries, 90% patients were admitted within 329 days, down from 361 days in 2022-23. Around 6.4% of patients waited more than a year – down from 9.6% in the previous reporting period (2022–23).
Ophthalmology didn’t fare as well with this metric either. Ninety percent of patients received their surgery within 350 days, while 6.5% waited more than more than 365 days.
Otolaryngology, head and neck surgeons, otherwise known as ENTs, had some of the worst wait times, with 50% admitted within 111 days, 90% within 429 days and 16.5% waiting more than a year.
But wait times have improved for eye surgery in recent years. Pre-COVID the average wait times were 82 days, but this increased to 118 days in 2020-21, 107 in 2021-22, and 105 in 2022-23. Now it’s 98 days.
The number of patients waiting more than a year for eye surgery has also come down after peaking during COVID at 12.7% in 2020-21, with this number now halved in the latest 2023-24 data.
AIHW spokesperson Ms Clara Jellie while most elective surgeries performed in Australia are undertaken in private hospitals, the data provided an overview of elective surgeries from public hospital waitlists.
“The increase in the number of admissions from public hospital elective surgery waitlists follows a period of considerable disruption to the health system as a result of the pandemic, where we saw fluctuations in the numbers of elective surgeries being performed as outbreaks of COVID-19 impacted patients, and the availability of hospital staff and resources,” she said.
“Elective surgeries are procedures that are deemed medically necessary, but are planned surgeries that are not conducted as a result of an emergency presentation, and as a result, may be subject to delays.”
The largest increases in elective surgery admissions compared with 2022-23 was seen in the ACT (19%) and Victoria (10%). Over a five-year period, the largest increases in admissions were in Tasmania (10% annual average increase since 2019–20), and in Victoria (4.9%).
Although the most common surgical specialty associated with admissions was ‘general surgery’, representing 20% of all surgeries, the areas of surgical speciality that have seen the greatest percentage increases in admissions from elective surgery waitlists were vascular surgery (12% increase compared with 2022-23) and ‘paediatric surgery’ (8.2% annual average growth since 2019-20).
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