About the Specialist Outpatient Waiting Time Report

Specialist outpatient services waiting time information is being reported on a quarterly basis from 1 July 2018. Having the likely waiting time available for specialist outpatient services will support patients and their doctors making informed decisions about treatment options.

Clinicians assess how urgent a patient referral is based on information provided by the referring Doctor. The waiting times identified in the Reports do not apply to urgent referrals that need to be seen by a clinician within 30 days. The waiting times in the Reports are for routine or non-urgent or not yet assessed patient referrals that can be added to an outpatient waiting list for an appointment.

The Reports include information about patients waiting for an appointment at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, The Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Lyell McEwin Hospital, Modbury Hospital, Flinders Medical Centre, Noarlunga Hospital and Women’s and Children’s Hospital for the services they provide.

There are multiple clinics that sit under each specialty and each delivers different services. An explanation of the types of conditions seen in the Speciality Outpatient Clinics as detailed in the Report are available on the types of conditions seen in Speciality Outpatient Clinics page.

For more information about the specialist outpatient services provided by SA Health, visit the Outpatient Clinics page.

To see the median and maximum waiting time for a particular specialty, see the Specialist Outpatient Waiting Time Report.

SA Health recognises the importance of having accurate outpatient specialist appointment waiting times for patients and their doctors to make informed decisions about treatment options.

SA Health is committed to improving the reporting of outpatient waiting list information.

Background

Information about hospital outpatient waiting times was not regularly reported by SA Health prior to 1 July 2018. SA Health hospitals have a number outpatient reporting systems that have different reporting outpatient waiting list capabilities. At this time, the accuracy and consistency of the outpatient waiting time information is a challenge for hospitals and the Department for Health and Wellbeing.