Waiting list update

The ADAVB issued two media releases yesterday regarding dental waiting times for public dental patients in Melbourne and in rural Victoria, which have received extensive print media and radio coverage across the State and indeed in other States also. Branch President Dr Chris Callahan has done 11 interviews, and our media monitoring suggests that the story has appeared in over 30 media outlets so far. These stories have emphasised that waiting times at some rural clinics are longer than 5 years, while there are still metropolitan clinics where waiting times longer than three years apply.

The information in the releases was compiled from information published last week under the Your Hospitals section of the Department of Human Services website. Dental waiting times (as at December 2005) are only available after navigating through about four further screens of information. If you don't know where to look, this information is hard to find.

The Department does not publish a summary of waiting times for all public clinics, making it a chore to load the individual waiting times for around 60 clinics across the State. Our releases include a summary table which shows the waiting times that were published by the Department in 2002, 2003 and 2005.