‘I’d rather die in someone’s Uber’: Tragic tales from a Sydney hospital in crisis

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When Tim Vincent, a double-lung transplant recipient, was experiencing the worst pain he says he had felt in his life, he called an Uber instead of an ambulance.

He knew the paramedics would take him to Blacktown Hospital, where a fortnight earlier he waited 13 hours in emergency with a punctured lung. Instead, he asked the Uber driver to take him to Westmead Hospital.

Tim Vincent spent 13 hours in Blacktown Hospital emergency with a hole in his lung before seeing a doctor.Credit: Kate Geraghty

“I’d never go there [to Blacktown] again,” the 55-year-old said. “I’d rather die in someone’s Uber.”

Emergency patients at Blacktown Hospital are facing some of the longest wait times in the state. The median wait time is five hours and 42 minutes, more than two hours longer than the state average, and only one in three patients leaves within four hours.

At the most extreme end, one in 10 patients waits more than 21 hours for treatment – 10 hours longer than the state average.

Staff say long wait times are also leading to increased patient aggression and violence. The NSW Nurses and Midwives Association confirmed a nurse was stabbed in the face with blunt scissors earlier this month.

“We are extremely concerned about these episodes of violence and aggression being experienced by emergency nurses at Blacktown Hospital,” assistant general secretary Michael Whaites told the Herald.

“Our members have a right to feel safe in their workplace.”

The hospital’s general manager, Brad Ceely, said: “We do not make comments on individual cases but can confirm no incidences of violence or aggression have been caused by recent ED wait times.”

Three patients shared their stories with the Herald, while many more staff and patients reached out but were unwilling or unable to speak publicly.

Chantelle Brown waited in the emergency department at Blacktown for five hours before getting an ultrasound that confirmed she needed her gall bladder removed. She said she was ushered back into the waiting room where she had no choice but to sleep on the floor. She was 22 weeks’ pregnant.

“It was very traumatic,” she said. “I’m not a complainer, I’m not that type of person. But this really knocked me.”

A family member issued a formal complaint to the hospital about her treatment, but they have not heard back. Brown is due to give birth to her third child at Blacktown in December and said she is concerned the situation at the hospital is not improving.

“It really scares me,” she said.

Ceely said that feedback from patients was taken seriously. “Staff from Blacktown Hospital contact the patient or their family directly upon receiving formal complaints,” he said.

The emergency department at Blacktown was touted by the Coalition as state-of-the-art when it was unveiled in August 2019 as part of the former government’s $700 million upgrade of the Mount Druitt and Blacktown hospitals.

“It was very traumatic. It really scares me.”

Blacktown councillor Allan Green, however, said he had written to the hospital’s general manager about the size of the waiting room, a fraction of the total floor area, which he said was exacerbating patient anxiety and contributing to the spread of infectious diseases.

“It’s ridiculous that they’ve got a brand-new building, but people are still not getting the care they deserve,” he said. “This situation is totally unacceptable.”

The hospital said that in the second quarter of 2023, it had seen more than 5000 category-two triage patients, the highest number of patients in this category since the Bureau of Health Information began reporting.

The health district has previously attributed long emergency wait times to bed-block, something the Mitton family has experienced first-hand.

When Jena Mitton’s legs had swollen to the point where she was unable to walk, her father Richard took her to Mt Druitt Hospital, knowing they would face a long wait in emergency at Blacktown.

But after getting a bed at Mt Druitt straight away, the 20-year-old was transferred to Blacktown to be admitted for treatment. Richard Mitton expected his daughter would be given a bed immediately but was told there weren’t enough beds, and she was taken to the emergency department.

“It was about 30 hours before we eventually got a bed,” he said. “When you have four kids, you don’t go to the hospital unless you absolutely need to, but the system didn’t really do what we needed it to do when we were in need.”

Health Minister Ryan Park said the additional 600 beds being built across western Sydney, as well as the establishment of urgent care clinics, would help to relieve the burden on hospital wait times.

“Families living in Western Sydney have the right to timely, equitable healthcare and they should have confidence in their local hospital,” Park said.

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