Public hospital patients in the northern and western suburbs are waiting twice as long as those in the south for MRI and CT scans, the auditor-general has found.
The average waiting period at four hospitals in the northern and western metropolitan areas was 60 days, compared with 27 days in three public hospitals in the south.
And some patients waited as long as 100 days for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and computed tomography (CT) scans.
The hospitals were not named in the report.
Auditor-General John Doyle tabled a report last Wednesday, outlining the effectiveness and efficiency of high-value equipment in public hospitals.
He found hospitals weren’t managing CT and MRI scanners efficiently and the Department of Health and Human Services was not adequately planning for future growth. “Planning undertaken by health services at the hospital level is inadequate,” Mr Doyle said.
“The Department of Health and Human Services does not include imaging services in its planning at the state level.
“I can’t be assured that CT and MRI services are being used optimally or that the state is well positioned to meet future demand.”
The auditor-general found there was a “considerable variation” in the number of scans being conducted.
“It is concerning that one hospital can have a wait list of up to 90 days for an MRI scan while the waiting time in a hospital less than 10 kilometres away is under three days,”
Mr Doyle said.“This is not making best use of costly resources.”
CT scanners cost between $1 million and $2 million and MR scanners from $1.5 million to $3 million.
The equipment has a life-span of only 10 years and each scanner costs more than $180,000 annually to maintain.
Mr Doyle said that if the department implemented the eight recommendations in the report, it would “help health services better utilise these expensive assets”.
