The Malinauskas Labor Government continues to improve ambulance response times, with ramping also reducing compared to the same period last year.
Latest March data released by SA Health shows ramping hours fell by 9.3 per cent compared to March 2025 – 384 fewer hours lost on the ramp.
This reduction was largely driven by improvements at the Royal Adelaide Hospital and The Queen Elizabeth Hospital.
These results come despite triple zero calls and emergency department presentations being higher than in the same period last year.
The total number of hours of ramping for March 2026 was 3,750. This figure also represents a 6.3 per cent reduction in hours ramped per day from February 2026.
The Lyell McEwin Hospital experienced the most significant increase, with 340 more ramping hours than the same time last year.
Growth in the northern suburbs is something we have been planning for, with the Malinauskas Labor Government set to transform a strategic nine-hectare site at Concordia into a new Greater Northern Adelaide Hospital.
The State Government has secured land on the corner of Springbett Road and Concordia Road through a partnership with CLT (Concordia Land Trust).
The hospital will service the growing outer northern suburbs and the Barossa Valley region, helping ease pressure on the busy Lyell McEwin Hospital. It will also reduce the flow of patients to city hospitals as more homes are built in the north to accommodate South Australia's growing workforce population.
There are currently 371 elderly South Australians stuck in metropolitan hospitals and other SA Health sites, medically ready for discharge but waiting for a Federal Government aged care bed.
In March, ambulances reached 76.9 per cent of Priority 1 cases within the target timeframe of eight minutes, compared to 70.3 per cent in February 2026.
Ambulances reached 65.4 per cent of Priority 2 cases in the target 16-minute timeframe in March 2026, compared to 64 per cent in February 2026. Both figures also represent improvements on March last year.
Full ramping data is available here.
Information regarding patients waiting for residential aged care can be found here.
As put by Blair Boyer
We always want to see ramping hours decrease, and we are investing in every way possible to help drive that number down.
No other government has invested more in the health system, including adding more than 600 extra hospital beds and recruiting more than 2,700 additional frontline workers, including doctors, nurses, ambulance officers and allied health workers.
When we see pressure points such as on the Lyell McEwin Hospital, it helps inform our decisions for future investment. This includes the decision to secure the nine-hectare site at Concordia for a new Greater Northern Adelaide Hospital.
While I'm pleased to see these improvements, we know there is more to do, and we will keep working across the board to drive further improvements across the health system.
