Table of contents

  • Preliminary material
    • Title and verso pages
    • Contents
    • Acknowledgments
    • Abbreviations
    • Summary
      • General recommendations
      • Recommendations for data development
    • Recommendations
      • General recommendations
      • Recommendations relating to data elements
  • Body section
    1. Introduction
      • Purpose of the evaluation
      • Structure of this report
      • National Minimum Data Sets (NMDSs) for Elective Surgery Waiting Times (ESWT)
      • Issues
    2. Method
      • Evaluating utility
      • Evaluating compliance
      • Linked public hospital admitted patient and elective surgery waiting times data
      • Recommendations for data development
    3. Evaluation of utility
      • Survey respondents
      • Uses of the NMDS specifications and NMDS-based data
      • Utility of the NMDSs
      • Suggestions for data development
      • Issues raised by other correspondents
    4. Comments on data elements
      • Data elements common to the ESWT (census data) NMDS and the ESWT (removals data) NMDS
      • Data elements specific to the ESWT (removals data) NMDS
      • Data elements specific to the ESWT (census data) NMDS
      • Supporting elements and glossary items
    5. Compliance evaluation
      • National summary 2005-06
      • State and territory summary 2005-06
      • Assessment of individual data elements 2005-06
      • Compliance summary 2006-07
    6. Clinical urgency
      • Variation in clinical urgency categorisation
      • State and territory policies and procedures
    7. Future directions
      • Standardisation of clinical urgency categorisation
      • Routine provision of linked elective surgery and admitted patient data
      • Total time waited
      • Improving the coverage of the NMDSs
      • Alternative measures of access to elective surgery
  • End matter
    • Appendixes
      1. List of data elements in the ESWT NMDSs
      2. National Minimum Data Sets for Elective Surgery Waiting Times
      3. Survey documentation
        • Attachment 3.1: Explanatory notes
        • Attachment 3.2: Criteria used by the Health Data Standards Committee to assess inputs to the National health data dictionary
      4. Survey respondents
      5. Projects to standardise the assignment of clinical urgency category
    • References
    • List of tables
    • List of figures