THE State Government has turned to the aged-care system to reduce pressure on overflowing metropolitan hospitals.
The Government is leasing 34 transitional-care beds - 29 in nursing homes across Adelaide and five at Noarlunga Private Hospital - to reduce the number of patients staying in acute-care beds while waiting for an aged-care place.
SA Health acting operations manager Derek Wright said there were already 16 nursing-home beds for transitional care, but negotiations for the additional 34 occurred this week.
"We know that some patients are staying in hospital for an extended period of time while they are waiting for an aged-care bed," he said.
Dr Wright said those patients were often better cared for in nursing homes.
"Some people want us to create more wards, but the reality is that, when we don't have the winter demand, we have empty beds," he said.
The beds will cost taxpayers $280 each a day. Acute hospital beds cost about $1000 a day.
Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation state secretary Elizabeth Dabars said the extra beds were welcome but "would not touch the sides" of a system-wide crisis.
"We are experiencing unsustainable pressure and this measure is completely inadequate for a system in crisis," she said.
AMA state president Peter Sharley said the state's hospitals were at capacity yesterday, after the initiative had been implemented on Wednesday.
"(The Royal Adelaide Hospital) has 72 patients today waiting for beds with some waiting for more than 24 hours," he said.
He said the increased number of aged-care beds should form part of a longer-term solution.
"Why can't they stay in place in the longer term as capacity issues are chronic?" he said.
South Australian Salaried Medical Officers Association senior industrial officer Andrew Murray said hospitals, particularly the Lyell McEwin, had been running over capacity even in lower-demand months.
Opposition health spokesman Duncan McFetridge said the measure should have been implemented much earlier.
"It's been recognised for a long time that there are patients whose length of stay in hospital exceeds months or years when they would be better off elsewhere," he said.
Aged Care Association state president Paul Carberry supported the move.
"From a patient's point of view . . . they will be looked after better," he said.
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