Aussie women 'too posh to push' | Gladstone Parenting | Parents and Children in Gladstone

iStock Photo

IT seems that some Australian women really are too posh to push.

A national report on the hospital system, to be issued on Tuesday, shows that private patients are much more likely to have a caesarean birth than public patients.

Forty-two per cent of pregnant women who go private have a caesarian, compared with 27 per cent of women in public hospitals.

More than 86,000 women had caesareans across both systems in 2007-08, according to the State of Our Public Hospitals report.

The report pointed to some alarming trends in the healthcare system.

Almost a third of people - 31 per cent - who present to emergency departments are not seen within the recommended time. That's more than the year before.

Some people are wasting the doctors' time. One in eight people who turn up at emergency are classified as "non-urgent".

When it comes to patients needing elective surgery, the average wait is 34 days, two days longer than the year before.

One in six patients do not get their elective surgery within the recommended time.

And matters are worse for indigenous patients. They're more than twice as likely to be admitted to hospital as non-indigenous patients. Many are admitted for dialysis.

Indigenous patients wait longer for elective surgery - 37 days on average.

Federal Health Minister Nicola Roxon said the report showed the decline of the health system under the Howard government, which was in charge for part of the time covered in the report.

Ms Roxon said the Rudd government was spending up big on hospitals under an agreement reached with the states last year.

The government will receive the final reports of the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission and the National Preventative Health Taskforce on Tuesday.

A spokesperson said the reports would not be made public immediately.