St John ambulance manager Stuart Cockburn said the extra ramping time had resulted in a reduction, on average, of nine ambulance shifts per day. If it looked like wait times were starting to ramp up, St John alerted hospitals to get in extra staff, he said. She said another consequence of ambulance ramping was loss of face-to-face communication. At Auckland City Hospital, ramping increased nearly 600 percent since 2019 and at Waikato, it was up more than 680 percent. To cure ambulance ramping and ED overcrowding, New Zealand needed more staffed hospital beds, more mental health beds, more aged-care beds - more of everything, she said.

Source: New Zealand Herald May 30, 2023 02:59 UTC