Questions & Answers Paper No. 158 - Parliament of New South ...

7093
LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
MONDAY 12 OCTOBER 2009
Answer—
(1) 0. All placements have been on the basis of an application endorsed by the student's parents or carers.
(2) to (5) See above.
(6) In 2008 there were 359 long suspensions from the 35 behaviour schools.
(7) The periods of long suspension ranged from 5 to 20 school days.
*7478 CASEMIX OR EPISODE FUNDING FORMULAE—Mrs Jillian Skinner asked the Deputy Premier,
Minister for Climate Change and the Environment, and Minister for Commerce representing the Attorney
General, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Health, Minister for the Central Coast, Vice
President of the Executive Council—
(1) What are the plans regarding use of Casemix or Episode Funding formulae to allocate resources to
hospitals in NSW?
(2) What variations will be applied to account for the different levels of care provided at individual
hospital?
(3) How will impacts, such as remoteness, community disadvantage and other variables, be dealt with?
(4) Are concerns, such as those expressed by the NSW Nurses Associations that Episode Funding
applied to Broken Hill Hospital will mean a cut of 37% to the budget, justified?
Answer—
(1) The Episode Funding Model has been a tool used across NSW Health since 2000⁄01. NSW Health
modelled episode (activity-based) funding as a hospital budget-setting tool in 2008⁄09. In 2009⁄10, 75
hospitals are receiving episode funding for their in-scope (acute and⁄or sub and non-acute) patient
activity.
(2) Under the NSW Health Episode Funding policy, public hospitals are grouped according to their
patient and service profile. Hospitals in each peer group share the same general operational
characteristics and are treated the same way for the purpose of episode funding. Peer hospital groups
facilitate fair comparisons of efficiency, quality and other performance parameters between similar
hospitals.
(3) The criteria used for peer grouping of public hospitals include:
• Size (number of beds, number of separations, casemix)
• Specialisation, complexity of care (casemix index, range and number of different
illnesses⁄procedures managed, proportion of surgical separations, patient transfers in (from
another acute care hospitals, Outpatient surgeries)
• Teaching status
• Non-acute activity
• Role
• Geography
• Characteristics of catchment population
(4) No. Episode Funding has not affected the total funds allocated to Area Health Services. Each Area
Health Service has determined the episode funding budget to be allocated to each of its in-scope
hospitals according to that hospital's activity targets and peer group pricing for 2009⁄10.
*7479 FUNDRAISING FOR ESSENTIAL HOSPITAL EQUIPMENT—Mrs Jillian Skinner asked the Deputy
Premier, Minister for Climate Change and the Environment, and Minister for Commerce representing the
Attorney General, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Health, Minister for the Central Coast,
Vice President of the Executive Council—
Given that the Royal North Shore Hospital Intensive Care Unit is one of the busiest in NSW treating
serious accident victims, severe burns injuries and those patients recovering from major surgery:
(1) Why is the Fundraising Department of Royal North Shore Hospital having to go to the public to ask
for contributions towards essential bedside equipment such as a portable ultrasound machine that
enables highest quality "on screen" guidance for insertion of life-saving tubing?
(2) How much money has been raised since the launch of this request in May 2009?
Answer—
I am advised:
(1) Strong and healthy communities often wish to show their appreciation and regard for their local
institutions including hospitals and schools by donating money to purchase extra equipment and
Produced by Altsoft Xml2PDF