One public hospital and one surgical specialty, such as general surgery, orthopaedics or ENT surgery, or ALL, for the quarter, with the patients treated and the share treated within the recommended time, the patients waiting, the long waits and the share waiting within the recommended time.

What does a dash mean?

Queensland Health writes a dash where it gives no figure for a hospital, such as a percentage with no patients behind it. Those cells are null here and flagged as suppressed. A few cells read NULL, and those are null too.

The quarter ending September 2025. This table is fixed to that file, and later quarters need the entry pointed at the new file.

Datasets / Queensland / Queensland Health / Elective surgery performance by hospital, Queensland

Elective surgery by specialty and hospital, Queensland, September quarter 2025

Name: Elective surgery by specialty and hospital, Queensland, September quarter 2025
Creator: Queensland Health
Published: 2025-12-10
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

live

Publisher Queensland HealthUpdated quarterlyLicence CC BY 4.0Latest 2025-12-10Rows 303Fields 15

Queensland Health elective surgery summary 2 for the quarter ending September 2025, one row per public hospital and surgical specialty. Each row has the volumes treated and waiting, the long waits, and the percentages treated and waiting within the clinically recommended time.

Also called: Elective surgery by specialty Queensland, QLD orthopaedic surgery waiting list, Queensland hospital surgery waiting by specialty.

Part of Elective surgery performance by hospital, Queensland, 2 tables the publisher releases together: Elective surgery by urgency category and hospital, Queensland, September quarter 2025.

Before you use it

What is in each row?: One public hospital and one surgical specialty, such as general surgery, orthopaedics or ENT surgery, or ALL, for the quarter, with the patients treated and the share treated within the recommended time, the patients waiting, the long waits and the share waiting within the recommended time.
What does a dash mean?: Queensland Health writes a dash where it gives no figure for a hospital, such as a percentage with no patients behind it. Those cells are null here and flagged as suppressed. A few cells read NULL, and those are null too.
Which quarter is it?: The quarter ending September 2025. This table is fixed to that file, and later quarters need the entry pointed at the new file.

Made for agents

Connect your AI agent

Any agent that connects to publicdata.au/mcp can find this dataset, read its 15 fields, count and filter across all 303 rows and diff its versions. Every answer names the version and carries Queensland Health's attribution. No key.

Then ask it: What does Elective surgery by specialty and hospital, Queensland, September quarter 2025 hold, and what changed in the newest version?

claude mcp add --transport http publicdata https://publicdata.au/mcp

One command. No key, no account, no sign-up.

https://publicdata.au/mcp

Streamable HTTP. Cursor, VS Code or any client that connects to a remote MCP server.

Using https://publicdata.au/llms.txt, how many people died on Queensland roads in 2025, by month?

For an assistant that reads the web and has no connector.

ExploreChart every row in your browser

A dashboard over every row. Click to filter, add panels, share a link or embed a frame.

Query APIFilter and count from a URL

aggregate?group=specialty_desc&metric=sum.long_waits&facility_code=eq.99999&specialty_code=neq.ALL

Patients waiting longer than recommended in each specialty, all reporting hospitals: 1,518 orthopaedic surgery, 1,346 ENT surgery, 1,055 general surgery, 990 urology.

Download it as Excel, CSV, JSON and 6 more formats

Pick a format and a version. Excel is picked first because it opens in the tools most offices have. The URL is yours to keep. A dated version never changes.

Format

Version "Latest" redirects to the newest version and will change when the publisher releases again. A dated version never changes.

https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/latest/data.xlsx

Download

In your own tools

Use it in Excel, R, Python and more

Excel and Power BI read the CSV from its address and refresh from it. The R and Python packages take any dataset on this site by its slug, so a new dataset needs no new release. The DuckDB file attaches read-only over HTTPS, and a query reads only the blocks it touches.

The dated URL in the code never changes. https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/latest/ redirects to the newest version.

https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/latest/data.csv

In Excel choose Data, then From Web, and paste this address. Excel keeps it, so Refresh All reads the newest version. A sheet holds about a million rows; past that, load the query to the Data Model.

https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/latest/data.csv

In Power BI Desktop choose Get data, then Web, paste this address and choose Anonymous when asked how to sign in. A scheduled refresh reads the same address, so the report follows each new version.

library(publicdataau)
df <- pd_read("qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty")
pd_attribution(df)

install.packages("publicdataau"). pd_read() fetches the version's Parquet file; pd_rows() and pd_aggregate() ask the query API instead, and pd_connect() attaches the DuckDB file.

import publicdata_au as pd_au
df = pd_au.read("qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty")
df.attrs["publicdata"]["attribution"]

pip install "publicdata-au[pandas]". read() fetches the version's Parquet file; rows() and aggregate() ask the query API, and connect() attaches the DuckDB file.

INSTALL httpfs; LOAD httpfs;
ATTACH 'https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/v/2025-12-10/data.duckdb' AS qld_elective_surgery_by_specialty (READ_ONLY);
SELECT specialty_desc, count(*) FROM qld_elective_surgery_by_specialty.records GROUP BY 1 ORDER BY 2 DESC;

The DuckDB file attaches read-only over HTTPS and only the blocks a query touches are read. Parquet works the same way: FROM read_parquet(url).

const res = await fetch("https://publicdata.au/api/v1/datasets/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/aggregate?group=specialty_desc&metric=sum.long_waits&facility_code=eq.99999&specialty_code=neq.ALL");
const { rows, publicdata } = await res.json();
console.log(rows, publicdata.attribution);

The query API answers a page on any site as well as Node, with no key. It returns the rows and the attribution the licence asks for.

What is in it

Column names are made snake_case and the publisher's original header is kept beside each one. Blank cells are null. Nothing is added, removed, ranked or summarised. Cells were typed and headers were made snake_case. Rows were left alone.

Field	Type	Publisher's header	Note
facility_code	string	Facility_Code	Kept as text.
facility	string	Facility_Name	A public hospital, or a group such as Queensland Reporting Hospitals for the state total.
report_month	string	Report_Month	The last month of the quarter, as the publisher writes it, such as Sep-25.
specialty_code	string	Specialty_Code
specialty_desc	string	Specialty_Desc
treated	integer	Vol_Treated
percent_treated_in_time	number	Percent_Treated_InTime
percent_change_treated_on_prior_year	number	Percent_Variation_Treated_Prior_Year
waiting	integer	Vol_Waiting
long_waits	integer	Vol_LongWaits
percent_waiting_in_time	number	Percent_Waiting_InTime_Total
data_last_update	date	data_last_update
long_waits_ready_for_surgery	integer	Vol_LongWaits_RFS
long_waits_not_ready_for_surgery	integer	Vol_LongWaits_NRFS
percent_waiting_in_time_ready_for_surgery	number	Percent_Waiting_InTime_RFS
suppressed	array		Names of the fields the publisher suppressed in this row. The cells are null.

Download this table as a data dictionary (Excel), or read it as a Frictionless Table Schema at schema.json. The key is facility_code, specialty_code.

A sample of 10 rows

The ten hospital specialties with the most patients waiting longer than recommended, most first. A blank cell is shown as null.

facility_code	facility	report_month	specialty_code	specialty_desc	treated	percent_treated_in_time	percent_change_treated_on_prior_year	waiting	long_waits	percent_waiting_in_time	data_last_update	long_waits_ready_for_surgery	long_waits_not_ready_for_surgery	percent_waiting_in_time_ready_for_surgery
141	Rockhampton	Sep-25	2	ENT surgery	0	null	-100	597	549	8	2025-10-28	537	12	7.9
172	Mackay	Sep-25	7	orthopaedic surgery	155	34.2	-14.4	894	376	57.9	2025-10-28	331	45	60.3
1	Mater Adult	Sep-25	9	urology	343	70.3	-2.8	931	367	60.6	2025-10-28	363	4	60.4
201	Royal Brisbane & Women's	Sep-25	8	plastic & reconstructive surgery	773	56	-2.2	1000	292	70.8	2025-10-28	280	12	70.6
200	Townsville	Sep-25	2	ENT surgery	194	49	-1	662	264	60.1	2025-10-28	204	60	65.2
141	Rockhampton	Sep-25	3	general surgery	200	62	-4.8	605	253	58.2	2025-10-28	237	16	58.9
136	Gladstone	Sep-25	3	general surgery	202	73.8	-13.3	401	200	50.1	2025-10-28	195	5	50
141	Rockhampton	Sep-25	7	orthopaedic surgery	114	54.4	25.3	579	197	66	2025-10-28	166	31	69.4
200	Townsville	Sep-25	6	ophthalmology	117	53	-36.1	534	153	71.3	2025-10-28	83	70	80.9
200	Townsville	Sep-25	9	urology	201	34.8	28.8	333	147	55.9	2025-10-28	104	43	56.1

The first row as JSON

As it appears in data.json.

GET https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/latest/data.json
{
  "facility_code": "1",
  "facility": "Mater Adult",
  "report_month": "Sep-25",
  "specialty_code": "2",
  "specialty_desc": "ENT surgery",
  "treated": 149,
  "percent_treated_in_time": 68.5,
  "percent_change_treated_on_prior_year": 27.4,
  "waiting": 262,
  "long_waits": 39,
  "percent_waiting_in_time": 85.1,
  "data_last_update": "2025-10-28",
  "long_waits_ready_for_surgery": 35,
  "long_waits_not_ready_for_surgery": 4,
  "percent_waiting_in_time_ready_for_surgery": 85.6,
  "suppressed": []
}

Query it without downloading

The query API returns only the rows you ask for, as JSON, NDJSON or CSV, from the same typed rows as the files. It needs no key. Build a query here and run it, then copy the URL or the code into your own work.

Try rows or aggregate for this dataset. The query builder needs JavaScript.

How filters work

Each filter is field=operator.value in the query string, and every filter must match. A number or date field compares as a number or date, and a text field compares as text. Values are case-sensitive except with ilike. Prefix not. to negate a filter, as not.eq.value.

Operator	What it matches
eq.value	Equal to the value.
neq.value	Not equal to the value. A blank cell does not match.
gt.value	Greater than the value.
gte.value	Greater than or equal to the value.
lt.value	Less than the value.
lte.value	Less than or equal to the value.
like.text	Matches a pattern where * stands for any run of characters. Case-sensitive.
ilike.text	The same as like, ignoring case.
in.(a,b,c)	Equal to any value in the list. A value cannot contain a comma.
is.null	Blank in the source, or suppressed by the publisher.

Parameter	What it does
select	Fields to return, comma-separated. Every field when absent.
order	field.asc or field.desc, comma-separated. The publisher's row order when absent.
limit	Rows per page, 1 to 10,000. 100 when absent.
offset	Rows to skip. The next URL in each answer sets it for you.
group	On aggregate, fields to group by, comma-separated.
metric	On aggregate, count, sum.field, avg.field, min.field or max.field, comma-separated. count when absent.
format	json, ndjson or csv. JSON carries the provenance header, and the others carry it in response headers.

Without a version the API answers from the newest loaded version, and that answer changes when the publisher releases again. Put versions/<date>/ before rows or aggregate for an answer that never changes. /api/v1/datasets/<slug>/versions lists the loaded versions. The 1 newest version is loaded; versions lists them.

The API allows 60 requests in 10 seconds from one address. Above that it answers 429 for 10 seconds with a Retry-After header, a RateLimit-Policy header and a JSON body that gives the limit. Every API answer carries the same RateLimit-Policy. A client should wait the Retry-After seconds, or read the files, which have no limit. openapi.json describes this dataset's query paths for client generators and agents.

https://publicdata.au/mcp is a remote MCP server over Streamable HTTP with the same tools, defined in the same place, so a tool added to the pages is added here too. It needs no key and no account. The row tools are held to the query API's limit of 60 queries in 10 seconds from one address, and each call is two queries because it also counts the matching rows. Add it to Claude Code with claude mcp add --transport http publicdata https://publicdata.au/mcp, add the URL in Claude as a custom connector, or give it to any client that connects to remote MCP servers. Each queryable dataset is also a resource at https://publicdata.au/d/<slug>/fields.json, which lists its fields with their types, the publisher's descriptions, their ranges and the values they hold, so an agent can read a dataset's shape before it writes a query.

Smaller files

The same rows split by a field, one JSON file each. Each file carries the same provenance header.

By specialty_desc (12 files)

ALL ENT surgery cardio-thoracic surgery general surgery gynaecology neurosurgery ophthalmology orthopaedic surgery other surgery plastic & reconstructive surgery urology vascular surgery

by/specialty_desc/index.json lists every file with its row count.

What changed

One version for every release the publisher has made since this site started following the dataset. The date is the day the file changed on the portal.

2025-12-10
303 rows15 fieldsutf-8-sigf35f7a73a5d7

versions.json · changes.json · history.tar.zst (12 KB, every version's Parquet and manifest)

Questions

How do I download Elective surgery by specialty and hospital, Queensland as a CSV file?

Open https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/latest/data.csv. It redirects to the newest dated version, which is https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/v/2025-12-10/data.csv today. The same path serves Excel, JSON, Parquet, SQLite, DuckDB, NDJSON, Arrow. A dated URL never changes, so use it when the file must stay the same.

Can I open Elective surgery by specialty and hospital, Queensland in Excel?

Yes. https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/v/2025-12-10/data.xlsx is a workbook with the 303 rows on a records sheet, the field list on a second sheet and the provenance on a third. The CSV also opens in Excel. https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/v/2025-12-10/data.csv.gz is the CSV at about a tenth of the size.

How often is Elective surgery by specialty and hospital, Queensland updated?

Queensland Health releases it quarterly. This site checks the portal every week and adds a dated version when the file changes.

Can I use Elective surgery by specialty and hospital, Queensland commercially?

Yes. CC BY 4.0 allows commercial use, redistribution and derived works as long as the attribution is kept. The attribution string is in this page's side column and inside every file.

Is this the official source for Elective surgery by specialty and hospital, Queensland?

No. The publisher is Queensland Health, and its page is https://www.data.qld.gov.au/dataset/elective-surgery. This site republishes the publisher's file without changing its content. The original sits beside every version as source.csv with its SHA-256, so the two can be compared.

How do I get only the rows for one specialty desc?

Every version has one JSON file per value of specialty_desc, 12 files in the current version, listed with row counts at https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/v/2025-12-10/by/specialty_desc/index.json. For example https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/v/2025-12-10/by/specialty_desc/all.json holds the 50 rows where specialty_desc is ALL.

What this site did to the data. Cells were typed, headers were renamed and the encoding was made UTF-8. Rows were left alone. The publisher's file sits beside every version as source.csv so the change can be checked.

The publisher releases Elective surgery performance by hospital, Queensland as 2 files at once, so all 2 tables here share a version date.

Attribution and citation

The licence requires the publisher's attribution. We ask that you also name publicdata.au and link to the version you used.

Queensland Health, Queensland Government, Elective surgery, sourced 3 October 2026, https://www.data.qld.gov.au/dataset/elective-surgery, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Serialised and versioned by National Digital at publicdata.au, https://publicdata.au/d/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty/v/2025-12-10/

The attribution alone is inside every file. Harvard is the author-date form a report or a brief asks for. Paste the HTML on a web page so the links carry.

Licence record

Queensland Health states the licence, CC BY 4.0, on its own page, which was read and recorded here on 1 October 2026.

Every fetch reads the licence again and stops when it has changed. The fetch that made version 2025-12-10 read it from www.data.qld.gov.au on 3 October 2026.

Also published on

Hugging Faceload_dataset("National-Digital/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty")
Kagglewith a starter notebook
ZenodoDOI 10.5281/zenodo.23122417

Each copy carries the same attribution and links back to this page.

For agents and tools

datapackage.jsonFrictionless data package pointing at the latest version
schema.jsonTable Schema for every field
schema.xlsxthe same field list as an Excel data dictionary
versions.jsonevery version with date, rows, fields and hash
changes.jsondiff for every consecutive pair
manifest.jsonwhere the bytes came from and when
Query APIfiltered rows and counts without a download
openapi.jsonOpenAPI 3.1 for this dataset's query paths
explore/charts and dashboards in the browser, shareable and embeddable
index.mdthis page as Markdown

This page carries a schema.org Dataset record and is listed in /.well-known/ard.json and /catalog.json.

Source

Queensland Health publishes this table on www.data.qld.gov.au. Questions about the content go to the publisher. Questions about the files here go to corrections.

Fetched 3 October 2026. Source SHA-256 f35f7a73a5d7ee6a…

Improve this dataset

This page is built from register/qld-elective-surgery-by-specialty.yaml on GitHub. Anyone can propose a fix to it, such as a clearer description or a field the publisher renamed, as a pull request.

Report a file that differs from the publisher's · How to contribute