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Name and Constituency of Member of Parliament
Miss Cheryl Chan Wei Ling
MP for Fengshan SMC
Question No. 1117
To ask the Minister for Health (a) from 2013-2016, what is the number of cases referred from the polyclinics to the Accident and Emergency departments (A&E) of the public hospitals; (b) how many of the referred cases are due to simple procedures that cannot be performed at the polyclinics; and (c) what are the reasons that those simple procedures must be referred to A&E.
Answer
1 The number of cases referred from polyclinics to A&Es at public hospitals were 55,000 in 2014, 57,000 in 2015 and 64,000 in 2016. Comparable figures for 2013 are not readily
2 The proportion of such referrals to total polyclinic attendances has been fairly small and constant at about 1% in each of the three years. Likewise, the proportion of such cases to total A&E attendances has been quite small and stable at about 4% over the same period.
3 We do not have statistics on how many of such referrals are for procedures that cannot be performed at the polyclinics. Today, polyclinics are able to attend to patients requiring minor procedures if the condition can be appropriately managed at a primary care setting. Patients with high risk factors, or patients presenting with conditions that require more specialised assessments, treatments or monitoring would however need to be referred to a hospital’s specialist outpatient clinic. Patients who require such services on an immediate basis may be referred to the hospital’s A&
4 MOH would continue to work with the polyclinics to build up capabilities to offer more treatments and procedures to Singaporeans at primary care settings.