Local Hospital Network (LHN)
Great Ocean Road Health
Hospitals in this LHN:
Lorne Community Hospital
Otway Health & Community Services [Apollo Bay]
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Admitted patient activity
Various types of care are provided to admitted patients. The care type describes the overall nature of a clinical service provided to an admitted patient during an episode of care. This is not the same as the diagnosis or condition that a person might attend hospital for. A single type of care can be used to manage many different conditions. Care type can be classified as:
- Acute care
- Newborn care
- Subacute and non-acute care—Rehabilitation care, Palliative care, Geriatric evaluation and management, Maintenance care and Psychogeriatric care
- Mental health care.
Refer to ‘More information about the data’ section below for definitions on the above care types.
Explore the data
In the data visualisation below, you can explore the number of hospitalisations by care type for public and private hospitals between 2018–19 and 2022–23, and by hospital, between 2013–14 to 2022–23.
Type of care
All data in these visualisations are available for download in the Data & downloads section of the MyHospitals website.
Hospital sector
This column graph shows the number of hospitalisations by care type and private/public between 2018–19 and 2022–23. National data is presented by public/private and care type (acute, geriatric evaluation and management, maintenance care, mental health care, newborn care, palliative care, psychogeriatric care and rehabilitation care). In 2022–23, there were 6,704,048 Acute care separations in public hospitals and 4,380,444 Acute care separations in private hospitals.
Hospitals and LHNs
This table explores on the number of hospital admissions between 2012–13 and 2022–23. Data is presented by measure (number of admissions and care type). Hospital-level data is available.
Highlights
In 2022–23, for the public and private sectors combined:
- 91% of hospitalisations were classified as episodes of Acute care
- 3.7% were classified as episodes of Rehabilitation care
- 2.9% were classified as episodes of Mental health care
- 0.5% were classified as episodes of Newborn care (this only refers to situations where the newborn requires specific care – not all births).
The proportions of hospitalisations for each care type varied by hospital sector. Public hospitals accounted for 60% of hospitalisations for Acute care, while private hospitals accounted for 80% of hospitalisations for Rehabilitation care.
Changes over time
Over the last five years, from 2018–19 to 2022–23, there has been an annual average increase in Acute care hospitalisations by 1.0% in public hospitals and 2.4% in private hospitals.
Acute care
In 2022–23:
- around 9 in 10 hospitalisations in public (94%) and private hospitals (88%) were for Acute care
- the most common principal diagnosis reported for overnight acute hospitalisations was Single spontaneous delivery (childbirth with minimal or no assistance; 2.8% of hospitalisations)
- almost 1 in 4 (23%) of same-day acute hospitalisations had a principal diagnosis of Care involving dialysis.
Changes over time
- Compared with 2021–22, in 2022–23, the number of Acute care hospitalisations increased by 4.4% for public hospitals and by 4.5% for private hospitals.
- Over the last five years, from 2018–19 to 2022–23, there has been an annual average increase in Acute care hospitalisations by 1.0% in public hospitals and 2.4% in private hospitals.
Newborn care
Newborns receiving care may have both ‘qualified’ (where the baby requires specialised care) and ‘unqualified’ days (where routine care is provided as part of the care for the mother). Refer to ‘More information about the data’ section below for definitions on qualified and unqualified care.
In 2022–23:
- there were 82,100 hospitalisations for newborn care with at least one qualified day—the majority of these (86%) occurred in public hospitals
- nearly 1 in 4 hospitalisations for newborn care had a principal diagnosis of Disorders related to short gestation and low birth weight, not elsewhere classified (23% of hospitalisations for qualified newborns) followed by Medical observation and evaluation for suspected diseases and conditions, ruled out (14% of hospitalisations for qualified newborns)
- almost all (95%) hospitalisations for newborn care were Discharged home and less than 0.26% Died.
Changes over time
Compared with 2021–22, in 2022–23:
- hospitalisations for qualified newborns increased by 1.5% in public hospitals, and decreased in private hospitals by 5.7%
- for unqualified newborns, hospitalisations decreased by 8.1% in public hospitals and decreased by 7.4% in private hospitals.
Compared with 2018–19, in 2022–23:
- hospitalisations for qualified newborns increased by an annual average of 2.8% (from 63,000 to 70,400) in public hospitals and increased in private hospitals by 0.2% (11,600 to 11,700)
- for unqualified newborns, hospitalisations decreased by an annual average of 2.7% in public hospitals and increased by 2.3% in private hospitals.
Subacute and non-acute care
- In 2022–23, 1 in 20 hospitalisations (5.0%) were for Subacute and non-acute care
- over the previous year, from 2021–22 to 2022–23, the number of hospitalisations for Subacute and non-acute care increased by 2.8% in public hospitals and increased by 15.5% in private hospitals
- over the last five years, from 2018–19 to 2022–23, there has been an annual average increase of 1.5% for Subacute and non-acute care hospitalisations in public hospitals and an annual average decrease of 1.0% in private hospitals.
Rehabilitation care
In 2022–23:
- there were around 449,000 Rehabilitation care hospitalisations, with 4 in 5 (80%) occurring in private hospitals
- New South Wales and Queensland combined accounted for 4 in 5 (81%) Rehabilitation care hospitalisations – 59% in New South Wales and 22% in Queensland.
Changes over time
- Over the previous year, from 2021–22 to 2022–23, the number of Rehabilitation care hospitalisations increased by 21.4% in public hospitals and 16.5% in private hospitals.
- Over the last five years, from 2018–19 to 2022–23, there has been an annual average decrease of 1.3% for Rehabilitation care hospitalisations in public hospitals and an annual average decrease of 1.2 % in private hospitals.
Palliative care
In 2022–23:
- nearly 9 in 10 (86%) of the 54,100 Palliative care hospitalisations occurred in public hospitals
- 1 in 2 (48%) hospitalisations for Palliative care had a neoplasm-related (cancer-related) principal diagnosis, with Malignant neoplasm of bronchus and lung accounting for 7.4% of Palliative care hospitalisations.
Mental health care
In 2022–23:
- over 3 in 5 (62%) of the 354,000 Mental health care hospitalisations occurred in private hospitals
- females (as identified in the data) accounted for 59% of all Mental health care hospitalisations.
- Over the previous year, from 2021–22 to 2022–23, the number of Mental health care hospitalisations in public hospitals increased by 1.4% (from 134,000 to 136,000) and decreased by 0.3% in private hospitals (218,400 to 217,900).
- Over the last five years, from 2018–19 to 2022–23, there has been an annual average decrease of 1.6% (146,000 to 136,000) of Mental health care hospitalisations in public hospitals and an annual average increase of 0.4% (214,000 to 216,000) in private hospitals.
What other information is available?
More information on these data are available in the Admitted patient care 2022–23: What services were provided? data tables.
Definitions of the terms used in this section are available in the Glossary.
Acute care
An episode of Acute care for an admitted patient is one in which the principal clinical intent is to do one or more of the following:
- manage labour (obstetric)
- cure illness or provide definitive treatment of injury
- perform surgery
- relieve symptoms of illness or injury (excluding palliative care)
- reduce severity of illness or injury
- protect against exacerbation and/or complication of an illness and/or injury which could threaten life or normal functions
- perform diagnostic or therapeutic procedures
Rehabilitation care
Rehabilitation care is care in which the primary clinical purpose or treatment goal is improvement in the functioning of a patient with an impairment, activity limitation, or participation restriction due to a health condition.
Rehabilitation care is always:
- delivered under the management of or informed by a clinician with specialised expertise in rehabilitation
- evidenced by an individualised multidisciplinary management plan, which is documented in the patient’s medical record, which includes negotiated goals within specified time frames and formal assessment of functional ability.
Palliative care
Palliative care is defined as care in which the primary clinical purpose or treatment goal is optimisation of the quality of life of a patient with an active and advanced life-limiting illness. The patient will have complex physical, psychosocial and/or spiritual needs.
Palliative care is always:
- delivered under the management of or informed by a clinician with specialised expertise in palliative care
- evidenced by an individualised multidisciplinary assessment and management plan, which is documented in the patient's medical record that covers the physical, psychological, emotional, social and spiritual needs of the patient and negotiated goals.
Mental health care
Mental health care is defined in this publication as care in which the primary clinical purpose or treatment goal is improvement in the symptoms and/or psychosocial, environmental, and physical functioning related to a patient’s mental disorder.
Mental health care:
- is delivered under the management of, or regularly informed by, a clinician with specialised expertise in mental health
- is evidenced by an individualised formal mental health assessment and the implementation of a documented mental health plan
- may include significant psychosocial components, including family and carer support.
Mental health care differs from mental health-related care reported in AIHW Mental health services reports. A hospitalisation is classified as mental health-related if:
- it had a mental health-related principal diagnosis, which, for admitted patient care in this report, is defined as a principal diagnosis that is either:
- a diagnosis that falls within the section on Mental and behavioural disorders (Chapter 5) in the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th revision, Australian Modification (ICD‑10‑AM) (codes F00–F99), or
- a number of other selected diagnoses (see the technical information for a full list of applicable diagnoses), and/or
- it included any specialised psychiatric care.
For 2021–22, mental health care refers to hospitalisations for which the care type was reported as Mental health. The care type Mental health was introduced from 1 July 2015. Prior to this, mental health admitted patient activity was assigned to one of the other care types.
‘Qualified’ newborn
A day is considered ‘qualified’ for health insurance benefits purposes when a newborn meet at least 1 of the following criteria:
- the newborn is the second or subsequent live born infant of a multiple birth, whose mother is currently an admitted patient
- the newborn is admitted to an intensive care facility in a hospital, being a facility approved by the Commonwealth Minister for the purpose of the provision of special care
- the newborn is admitted to or remains in hospital without its mother.
A newborn admission to hospital can occur at any time within the first 9 days of life, including at the time of birth.
‘Unqualified’ newborn
The reporting of unqualified newborns has changed over time and varies across jurisdictions. Prior to 2017–18, newborn episodes involving unqualified care were routinely excluded from national reporting on the basis that they did not meet admission criteria for all purposes. However, due to changes in Newborn care practices (such as, care being provided to unqualified newborns on the ward rather than in a special care nursery) stakeholders have expressed interest in the reporting of all newborn episodes, regardless of qualification status.
Admitted patient access
Length of stay is the number of days between admission to hospital, and when that episode of hospital care ends. The Average Length of Stay (ALOS) is calculated as the total number of patient days reported for the hospital (or group of hospitals), divided by the number of hospitalisations.
Explore the data
In the data visualisation below, you can view the ALOS by selected medical procedures, by state and territory, and by type of hospital (peer group).
Average length of stay
All data in these visualisations are available for download in the Data & downloads section of the MyHospitals website.
Hospital sector
This bar graph shows the average length of stay for selected AR-DRGs in 2022–23. Data is presented by public/private hospital. National data is available. In 2022–23, heart failure and shock had the longest length of stay for private hospitals at 6.6 days and for public hospitals at 4.0 days.
Hospitals and LHNs
This figure shows the average length of overnight stay between 2012–13 and 2022–23. Data is presented by measure (average length of overnight stay, number of hospital stays, number of overnight bed stays, and percentage of hospital stays that were overnight), procedure category and peer group. Hospital data is available.
Highlights
In 2022–23:
- the ALOS for overnight hospitalisations in Australia was 5.7 days (6.0 days for public hospitals and 5.1 days for private hospitals)
- there were notable differences (more than 1 day) in the ALOS between public and private hospitals for 6 of the 20 selected diagnosis groups – the AR-DRGs (for example, the ALOS for Chronic obstructive airways disease, minor complexity was 2.9 days for public hospitals and 5.8 for private hospitals).
Between 2018–19 and 2022–23,
- the overall ALOS for all hospitalisations remained stable at around 2.7 days
- the ALOS for overnight hospitalisations in public hospitals increased on average by 2.7% per year (5.3 to 5.8 days), and private hospitals increased on average by 2.7% (5.4 to 6.0 days).
Significant changes in ALOS over time may be related to changes in admission practices, changes in the types of treatments provided and clinical practices.
What other information is available?
More information about ALOS can be found in Tables 2,9 to 2.11, S2.8 and S2.9 in Admitted patient care 2022–23: How much activity was there?
Definitions of the terms used in this section are available in the Glossary.
Average length of stay
The average length of stay (ALOS) is calculated as the total number of patient days reported for the hospital (or group of hospitals), divided by the number of separations. Two measures for ALOS are presented:
- ALOS for all separations
- ALOS excluding same-day separations
Performance indicator: Average length of stay for selected AR-DRGs
The ALOS for selected AR-DRGs can be considered as an indicator of hospital efficiency and sustainability. The selected AR-DRGs were chosen on the basis of:
- homogeneity, where variation is more likely to be attributable to the hospital’s performance rather than variations in the patients themselves
- representativeness across clinical groups
- differences between jurisdictions and/or sectors
- policy interest, as evidenced by (1) inclusion of similar groups in other tables in Australian hospital statistics, such as indicator procedures for elective surgery waiting time, (2) high volume and/or cost and (3) changes in volume over years.
Due to changes in the AR-DRG classification, the data presented here are not comparable with the data presented in previous years.