The government has gone out to tender to employ nurses at the City Watch House, Elizabeth, Port Adelaide, Christies Beach and Port Augusta police cells over five years.

According to tender documents released this week, the nurses would be tasked with treating injured SA Police officers, conducting forensic procedures on detainees and undertaking COVID-19 testing and infection control. The nurses would not drug test detainees.

The government states the “Nurses in Custodial Facilities” program, to begin next year at a cost of $13.9 million across the forward estimates, would free up resources at SA Health and SA Police, as police officers would no longer need to transport detainees with non-urgent medical conditions to hospital emergency departments to receive treatment.

It follows a trial at the Elizabeth Police Station in 2019, during which registered nurses assessed the mental wellbeing of all detainees as they were taken into custody, managed their medication and conducted first aid.

“Successful trials of the Nurses in Custodial facilities program found that placing nurses in custodial settings reduced the need for police to attend a hospital with detainees,” Police and Correctional Services Minister Joe Szakacs told InDaily. 

“The trials found that medic nurses provide operational efficiencies for SAPOL and SA Health through the diversion of detainees from emergency departments.

“Embedded nurses free up police to keep them on the front line – not waiting on hospitals guarding detainees.”

The Australiasian College for Emergency Medicine has previously called on the government to introduce a custodial health service to provide healthcare for those under arrest.

The college’s South Australian chair Dr Michael Edmonds said the service could reduce strain on emergency departments.

“If properly planned, resourced, supported, and reviewed, it is the College’s position that the Nurses in Custodial Facilities program could support more police and detainees to receive the acute healthcare they need, faster, and potentially provide a local reduction in presentations to emergency departments,” he said.

Of the 1666 detainees who were arrested at the City Watch House between January 1 and March 30 this year, 589 – or 35 per cent – received medical care.

The second biggest police custodial facility in the state, the Elizabeth Police Station, detained 1218 suspects during that time, of whom 512 – or 42 per cent – received medical attention.

At 9am this morning, SA Health’s emergency department dashboard showed Flinders Medical Centre and Lyell McEwin Hospital were at “code white”, meaning all of their treatment rooms were in use.

Lyell McEwin Hospital reported the longest emergency department wait time at 433 minutes – over seven hours.

Busy times at LMH ED and across the system. pic.twitter.com/otIVK4r7Ck

— SASMOA (@sasmoa4doctors) September 12, 2022