The Queensland government has pledged to publish key hospital performance data online every three months amid a prolonged capacity crisis.
More than 622,000 people presented at emergency departments between January and March this year, a 14 per cent increase over the same period last year, according to data published on Friday.
There were also almost 37,000 elective surgeries undertaken in the first three months of the year, an 8.8 per cent rise over the first quarter of 2020.
Health Minister Yvette D'Ath says surging demand isn't only from a backlog that built up during the peak of the pandemic, but did not detail other causes of the patient increase.
"All of our staff do a fantastic job, but the pressure across the system needs to be acknowledged," she told reporters.
"The COVID-19 pandemic has been a contributor, but we are continuing to see increases in patient numbers unrelated to COVID as well."
Ms D'Ath unveiled a new website called Inform My Care on Friday that allows people to search key performance indicators across public and private hospitals.
The site includes information on maternity options and outcomes, post-surgery infection rates, elective surgery wait times and other performance indicators.
She said it would be the first "one-stop shop" for that type of data in any state or territory.
However, the minister ruled out uploading real-time data, which has been a demand of the state opposition, saying the figures would be updated every quarter.
"It is a huge amount of work to get this volume of data, every single hospital across Queensland and aged care, all of this data in," Ms D'Ath said.
"That inevitably can't be real time as in today, but it is very current data that will be updated every quarter."
Private healthcare providers, hospitals, disability providers, and aged care providers in particular have been asked to contribute data.
Ms D'Ath said 394 of the 494 private aged care providers had opted out from the new website.
"I strongly encourage them to be part of this website, be part of sharing this information, being transparent, because consumers want choice and consumers want confidence in the quality of care that they get," the minister said.
Earlier on Friday, the Australian Medical Association Queensland called for key performance indicators to be published online.
The AMAQ's Kim Hansen said systemic change, rather than extra funding, was crucial for easing capacity pressure.
"There's no time to wait - emergency departments are more crowded than ever," Dr Hansen said.
"Sick and injured Queenslanders are waiting hours to get into an ED and may then have to wait days to move from the ED into a hospital ward.
"There is enormous pressure on overworked staff and we are deeply worried about their wellbeing."
The Queensland government said on Tuesday its budget outlay on health would be more than $22 billion in 2021/22.
Australian Associated Press
