National Healthcare Agreement: PI 20a–Waiting times for elective surgery: waiting times in days, 2019

Identifying and definitional attributes

Metadata item type:Help on this termIndicator
Indicator type:Help on this termProgress measure
Short name:Help on this termPI 20a–Waiting times for elective surgery: waiting times in days, 2019
METEOR identifier:Help on this term698999
Registration status:Help on this term
  • Health, Superseded 13/03/2020
Description:Help on this term

Median and 90th percentile waiting times for elective surgery in public hospitals, including by intended procedure.

Indicator set:Help on this termNational Healthcare Agreement (2019)
Health, Superseded 13/03/2020
Outcome area:Help on this termHospital and Related Care
National Health Performance Authority (retired), Retired 01/07/2016
Health, Standard 07/07/2010

Collection and usage attributes

Computation description:Help on this term

Elective surgery as defined in the National Elective Surgery Waiting Times Data Collection.

For 2016–17, intended procedures are as defined in permissible values 001 to 017 in Elective surgery waiting list episode—intended procedure, code NNN.

For 2017–18, intended procedures are as defined in permissible values 001 to 017 in Elective surgery waiting list episode—intended procedure, code NNN.

Waiting time as defined in Elective surgery waiting list episode—waiting time (at removal), total days N[NNN]. Calculated by jurisdictions by subtracting the listing date for care from the removal date, minus any days the patient was waiting with a less urgent clinical urgency category than their clinical urgency category at removal, and excluding days where the patient was not ready for care.

Waiting times are calculated for patients whose reason for removal was:

  1. Admitted as an elective patient for awaited procedure by or on behalf of this hospital or the state/territory.
  2. Admitted as an emergency patient for awaited procedure by or on behalf of this hospital or the state/territory.

Analysis by state and territory based on location of service.

Analysis by remoteness and Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) Index of Relative Socio-Economic Disadvantage (IRSD) is based on usual residence of the person.

Presented as number of days.

Computation:Help on this term

Number of days waited at 50th and 90th percentile.

Calculated overall and for each intended procedure.

The 50th and 90th percentiles have been rounded to the nearest whole number of days.

The calculation is where:

n is the number of observations and

p is the percentile value divided by 100,

then n × p = i + f (where i is an integer and f is the fractional part of n × p).

If n × p is an integer, the percentile value will correspond to the average of the values for the ith and (i+1)th observations.

If n × p is not an integer, the percentile value will correspond to the value for the (i+1)th observation.

Numerator data elements:Help on this term
Data Element / Data Set

Elective surgery waiting list episode—reason for removal from a waiting list, code N

Data Source

National Hospital Morbidity Database (NHMD)

NMDS / DSS

Admitted patient care NMDS 2016-17

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Data Element / Data Set

Elective surgery waiting list episode—reason for removal from a waiting list, code N

Data Source

National elective surgery waiting times data collection

NMDS / DSS

Elective surgery waiting times NMDS 2017-18

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Data Element / Data Set

Elective surgery waiting list episode—waiting time (at removal), total days N[NNN]

Data Source

National Hospital Morbidity Database (NHMD)

NMDS / DSS

Admitted patient care NMDS 2016-17

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Data Element / Data Set

Elective surgery waiting list episode—waiting time (at removal), total days N[NNN]

Data Source

National elective surgery waiting times data collection

NMDS / DSS

Elective surgery waiting times NMDS 2017-18

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Disaggregation:Help on this term

2016–17 (revised following jurisdiction provision of elective surgery waiting times cluster data to the National Hospital Morbidity Database (NHMD)), 2017–18—State and territory, by intended procedure (and total), by:

  • peer group
  • Indigenous status

2016–17 (revised following jurisdiction provision of elective surgery waiting times cluster data to the NHMD)—State and territory, by:

  • remoteness (Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) 2011 Remoteness Structure)
  • 2011 SEIFA IRSD quintiles

2016–17 (revised following jurisdiction provision of elective surgery waiting times cluster data to the NHMD)—Nationally, by (all not reported):

  • 2011 SEIFA IRSD deciles
  • selected intended procedures (cataract extraction, cholecystectomy, coronary artery bypass graft, cystoscopy) by 2011 SEIFA IRSD quintiles
  • intended procedure, by peer group, by Indigenous status, by remoteness (ASGS 2011 Remoteness Structure).

Some disaggregations may result in numbers too small for publication.

Disaggregation by peer group uses the peer group classification as described in the AIHW publication Australian hospital peer groups.

Disaggregation data elements:Help on this term
Data Element / Data Set

Establishment—organisation identifier (Australian), NNX[X]NNNNN

Data Source

National elective surgery waiting times data collection

NMDS / DSS

Elective surgery waiting times NMDS 2017-18

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data
Used for disaggregation by state/territory and to derive hospital peer group

Data Element / Data Set

Establishment—organisation identifier (state/territory), NNNNN

Data Source

National Hospital Morbidity Database (NHMD)

NMDS / DSS

Admitted patient care NMDS 2016-17

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Used to derive hospital peer group

Data Element / Data Set

Person—area of usual residence, statistical area level 2 (SA2) code (ASGS 2011) N(9)

Data Source

National Hospital Morbidity Database (NHMD)

NMDS / DSS

Admitted patient care NMDS 2016-17

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Used for disaggregation by state/territory, remoteness and SEIFA IRSD

Data Element / Data Set

Person—Indigenous status, code N

Data Source

National Hospital Morbidity Database (NHMD)

NMDS / DSS

Admitted patient care NMDS 2016-17

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Data Element / Data Set

Person—Indigenous status, code N

Data Source

National elective surgery waiting times data collection

NMDS / DSS

Elective surgery waiting times NMDS 2017-18

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Data Element / Data Set

Elective surgery waiting list episode—intended procedure, code NNN

Data Source

National Hospital Morbidity Database (NHMD)

NMDS / DSS

Admitted patient care NMDS 2016-17

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Data Element / Data Set

Elective surgery waiting list episode—intended procedure, code NNN

Data Source

National elective surgery waiting times data collection

NMDS / DSS

Elective surgery waiting times NMDS 2017-18

Guide for use

Data source type: Administrative by-product data

Comments:Help on this term

Most recent data available for 2019 National Healthcare Agreement performance reporting: 2017–18.

Intended procedures are a subset of all procedures, e.g. in 2016–17, approximately 64% of removals did not fall into one of the selected intended procedures.

For 2016–17 data, the 2011 SEIFA IRSD quintile and decile data will be produced using the Australian Statistical Geography Standard 2011 geographical unit of Statistical Area Level 2.

The scope of the National Elective Surgery Waiting Times Data Collection is patients on, or removed from, waiting lists for elective surgery which are managed by public acute hospitals.

Note that for the 2016 and previous reports, disaggregations by public hospital peer group for this indicator were calculated using the peer group classification method as reported in Australian hospital statistics 2010–11.

Representational attributes

Representation class:Help on this termPercentile
Data type:Help on this termReal
Unit of measure:Help on this termTime (e.g. days, hours)
Format:Help on this term

N[NNN]

Indicator conceptual framework

Framework and dimensions:Help on this termAccessibility

Data source attributes

Data sources:Help on this term
Data Source

National elective surgery waiting times data collection

Frequency

Data custodian

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare

Data Source

National Hospital Morbidity Database (NHMD)

Frequency

Annual

Data custodian

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare

Accountability attributes

Reporting requirements:Help on this term

National Healthcare Agreement

Organisation responsible for providing data:Help on this term

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare

Further data development / collection required:Help on this term

Specification: Final, the measure meets the intention of the indicator.

Source and reference attributes

Reference documents:Help on this term

AIHW (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare) 2012. Australian hospital statistics 2010–11. Health services series no. 43. Cat. no. HSE 117. Canberra: AIHW.

AIHW 2015. Australian hospital peer groups. Health services series no. 66. Cat. no. HSE 170. Canberra: AIHW.

Relational attributes

Related metadata references:Help on this term
Supersedes National Healthcare Agreement: PI 20a–Waiting times for elective surgery: waiting times in days, 2018
  • Health, Superseded 19/06/2019
Has been superseded by National Healthcare Agreement: PI 20a–Waiting times for elective surgery: waiting times in days, 2020
  • Health, Standard 13/03/2020
See also National Healthcare Agreement: PI 20b–Waiting times for elective surgery: proportion seen on time, 2019
  • Health, Superseded 13/03/2020
See also National Healthcare Agreement: PI 32–Patient satisfaction/experience, 2019
  • Health, Superseded 13/03/2020