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Data and Statistics

Northern Child Health Network

Children of Australia

Hunter New England Area Health Service

North Coast Area Health Service

 

The Northern Child Health Network

The Northern Child Health Network (NCHN) covers an area of 165,570 square kilometres, approximately 20% of the state of NSW. It extends from the Hunter to the NSW/Queensland border and covers the Hunter New England Area Health Service and the North Coast Area Health Service.

The NCHN accounts for 20% of the paediatric population aged 0 to 16 yrs of NSW and totals approximately 302,000 children. Of the 47 Local Government Areas (LGA) covered by the NCHN their total populations have been classified against the ARIA+ in the following ways:

• 8.6% - Metropolitan
• 40.5% - Inner regional
• 50.1% - Outer regional
• 0.8% - Remote

The two Area Health Services within the Northern Child Health Network operate within the following parameters:

AHS sites	121
Hospitals and MPS	63
Hospitals with newborn services	27
Population 0-16 yrs	302,000
ED admissions per annum 0 to 16 yrs of age	94,864
Paediatric unit admissions per annum	40,237
Area health service sites	63
Sites admitting children	23
Designated paediatric units, level 4 and above	9
Sites with general paediatricians	9

They are among the Area Health Services with the highest proportion of:

• injury and poisoning deaths in NSW (1998 to 2002)
• interpersonal violence-related hospital separations for children aged 0-14 years (1998-99 to 2002-03)

 

Source:

• Report of the Chief Health Officer, December 2004. NSW Department of Health
• NSW Health
• HNEH HIE
• EDDC
• NCH Population Health and Planning