Alexandra Hospital to receive emergency ambulance cases from Oct

Alexandra Hospital (AH), which currently operates an urgent care centre that handles acute care cases but not emergency ambulance cases, will start receiving ambulance cases from Oct 1.

- Joyce Teo Senior Health Correspondent

The move is part of the hospital’s efforts to ramp up its emergency response in preparation for a fully functioning emergency department (ED) in 2028, when the hospital is redeveloped into an integrated health campus.

From Oct 1, Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) ambulances will be sending certain non-life-threatening cases - such as breathlessness, giddy spells, fractures, rashes and allergies — to the hospital if they are from the vicinity, said Dr Keith Ho, a senior consultant emergency physician and head of AH’s urgent care centre.

However, if a case turns out to be life-threatening, the hospital and ED team would still be able to handle it, he added.

This initiative at AH is part of a broader national effort to balance ED workloads and reduce wait times of emergency services.

Singapore is facing growing healthcare demand as the population ages, with emergency medical services experiencing a significant increase in demand.

In 2024, the SCDF responded to over 245,000 calls made to the 995 emergency hotline, averaging 672 a day — a 57 per cent increase from 2014.