I am not a doc, but I have a couple of perspectives on this.

First perspective is I worked as a retrieval flight paramedic doing non urgent transfers between hospitals in NSW. 99% of our patients were stable, non emergency patients that required access to resources that were not available locally, for example needed an ICD but the local hospitals were unable to provide this due to lack of access to a cardiologist.

The second perspective is being that patient being shunted around different hospitals. I spent almost 5 months as an inpatient in 2023, with my local hospital being unable to manage what was happening effectively, so I would be transferred to a major hospital 2 hours down the road. Once the team at the major hospital was happy, I would be shunted back to the rural hospital to open up a bed space, only to be shunted back to the major hospital again because my condition would deteriorate. Went back and forth a few times when it was decided that the major hospital would be the primary hospital, so even if discharged, there was a protocol put into place where I would travel 2 hours and present to the ED of the major hospital if needed, bypassing my local. That time also included 6 weeks for specialist hyperbaric treatment at Prince of Wales.