A leading Australian Emergency Physician in Queensland has written 2 open letters which were printed anonymously in Brisbane’s Courier Mail newspaper in May 2008.

In the first letter titled “I will be your doctor“, he talks of the crisis facing Australian Emergency Departments - specifically the problem of access block, where new patients arriving in the Emergency Department cannot be seen or treated because ED space is taken by patients waiting for in-patient beds.

Patients on trolleys are in the corridors, and there they stay until a free bed is found. Sound dangerous? Sure is. I am making life and death decisions in an overcrowded noisy chaotic environment, and it is your life or death I am deciding about. No wonder we’re both stressed.

In the second letter “Five steps to a cure” he outlines 5 ideas which he hopes will help tackle the growing problem.

Queensland in particular is experiencing a growth in population. As reported by the Courier Mail, the population has increased by 100,000 in the past two and a half years, but the number of hospital beds has increased by only 900.