Emergency Department
In an emergency
If you have a life-threatening medical condition, call 000 and request an ambulance.
If you have an urgent medical condition:
Royal Perth Hospital Emergency Department
We are an adult hospital located in Wellington Street with entry off Victoria Square. We are open 24 hours a day, every day of the year.
Patients are seen in order of illness severity, and not in order of attendance. If another patient arrives with a more serious condition, you will be required to wait. We thank you for your patience and understanding.
If possible, please bring with you:
- your Medicare Card
- any health care, pension, veterans, safety net cards
- your passport/health insurance details (overseas visitors/students)
- private health insurance details (if you want to be admitted as a private patient)
- a list of your current medications
- any x-rays/ultrasounds/scans related to your condition
- your employment contact details if your condition is covered by Workers’ Compensation
- the name of your General Practitioner (GP).
When you arrive
See the triage nurse first - they will ask questions and assess your condition to determine your level of priority:
- Immediate (life threatening)
- Very urgent
- Urgent
- Standard
- Non-urgent
Some patients will be taken straight into the Emergency Department. Others will be directed to the waiting room.
While you are waiting, please inform the triage nurse if:
- your condition worsens
- you decide to seek treatment elsewhere.
What happens next?
Once you are inside the Emergency Department, you will undergo a thorough assessment by a team of nursing and medical staff.
If necessary, tests and procedures will be carried out. Pending the results, treatment will be provided.
The team will then decide to:
- allow you to return home with a referral if necessary for further care (such as a follow-up appointment with your local doctor or an outpatient appointment)
- monitor your condition for a few hours before making a decision
- admit you to the hospital for further care.
Sometimes patients must wait for test results or for a ward bed to become available. This may cause unavoidable delays in the Emergency Department. Our staff will continue to care for you until you can go to a ward or be discharged home.
Further information
Each year the RPH Emergency Department (ED) sees more than 84,000 patients, including 1,500 who are priority one (resuscitation) cases and 500 major trauma cases.
Our ED is Western Australia’s only accredited major trauma centre and we see 75 per cent of all trauma cases.
We also provide a toxicology service that admits more than 1,500 patients each year.
To discourage behaviour that may result in injury or death, we host a Prevent Alcohol and Risk-related Trauma in Youth (PARTY) program.
We also conduct research is conjunction with the Centre for Clinical Research in Emergency Medicine at the Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research (external site).