Gold Coast Health says the use of more experienced nurses is helping ease congestion at the University Hospital’s emergency department.
The nurse practitioners have at least six years of advanced clinical experience and six years tertiary education.
Nurse practitioner Chris Raftery said they can independently treat, diagnose and discharge some patients.
“If you have something like you’ve broken your leg or you’ve had a problem with your eye or something that’s likely to not need admission to hospital, then it may be a possibility that a nurse practitioner will be seeing you and it also enables the highly skilled emergency doctors that we work alongside with to concentrate on some of the high-end cases that need complex treatment and admission.”