The ACT Australian Medical Association has urged Canberrans to avoid unnecessary trips to the emergency department and praised the efforts of staff working overtime to meet demand.
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ACT Health has sought to bolster its staffing profile at Canberra Hospital with patients facing some of the longest waiting times in the nation.
ACT Health Minister Simon Corbell said he had spoken extensively with ACT Health Director-General Nicole Feely about the problem and had agreed it was a top priority for the government.
"There's quite a bit of work happening right now, focused on fixing these problems and identifying where the problems are," he said.
ACT AMA president Dr Elizabeth Gallagher said the challenges facing the emergency department were not new and the government was taking them seriously.
"From my perspective, it is not great that patients are waiting so long although it is good we are still seeing the life-threatening cases in a timely manner," she said.
Dr Gallagher said the search for emergency department staff was not easy given the difficulty of recruiting and retaining medical staff in the ACT.
"We are certainly training enough junior nurses although the more senior and experienced staff are required to teach and train them on the job," she said.
"When you are working in a busy emergency department, that responsibility can add to the stress of the job.
"It is important to reduce the level of stress placed on these staff members so people should only go to the emergency department for things that cannot be dealt with through other modes of care."
Mr Corbell said the government had an active recruitment program to replace retiring staff and was already working to increase the department's capacity.
"There is no doubt that working in a hospital can be stressful at times and people respond to that in a range of ways," he said.
An ACT Health spokesman said staff were not working in violation of their enterprise agreement and were not forced to work overtime.
"As with other parts of the hospital, some staff have agreed to do overtime shifts," he said
The ACT government has allocated $23 million for an extension of the Canberra Hospital emergency department to cope with increasing demand.
The extension will increase the number of beds 40 per cent, from 54 to 75, while the government considers further redeveloping the hospital.
"We're very focused on improving patient flows, analysing how patients move from one part of the hospital to another to make sure our emergency department is more efficient and more timely in the service it provides," Mr Corbell said.
The Health Minister also said an overdue independent review of the culture and management of training programs at Canberra Hospital was in the process of finalisation.
"I expect to receive that shortly and then we will be taking further steps in relation to that," he said.
The report, which will be led by consultancy firm KPMG, comes after years of allegations of bullying and mismanagement.
Trainee doctors and senior medical officers were given the opportunity to speak confidentially; a move Ms Feely said would strengthen the review and lead to better recommendations for improvement.
