---
title: "Hospital Authority A&E waiting times"
method: GET
path: "/api/v1/data-gov-hk/ha/ae-waiting"
tags: ["Public Finance & Government"]
---

# Hospital Authority A&E waiting times

`GET /api/v1/data-gov-hk/ha/ae-waiting`

Accident & Emergency waiting times across public hospitals operated by the Hong Kong Hospital Authority. Returns per-hospital wait snapshots for triage Categories I (critical) and II (emergency), plus median (P50) and 95th-percentile (P95) waits for Categories III, IV, and V. Upstream refreshes every 15 minutes; Sugra caches for 10 minutes.

## Query parameters

- `lang` string — Hospital Authority response language: `en`, `tc`, or `sc`.

## Response `200`

Per-hospital A&E waiting-time snapshots across the public hospital system.

- EnvelopeHaAeWaitingPayload
  - `data` HaAeWaitingPayload, required — Response payload for `/api/v1/data-gov-hk/ha/ae-waiting`.
    - `lang` string, required — Hospital Authority language code echoed back.
    - `update_time_utc` string, nullable — Upstream updateTime as ISO 8601 UTC.
    - `update_time_hkt` string, nullable — Original upstream updateTime string in HKT local.
    - `hospital_count` integer, required — Number of hospitals in the response.
    - `hospitals` HaAeHospitalWait[], required — Per-hospital waiting-time snapshots.
      - `hospital_name` string, nullable — Hospital name (language matches the `lang` parameter).
      - `t1_wait` string, nullable — Category I wait time (critical, human-readable).
      - `t1_manages_case` string, nullable — `Y` / `N` - whether the hospital currently handles Category I cases.
      - `t2_wait` string, nullable — Category II wait time (emergency, human-readable).
      - `t2_manages_case` string, nullable — `Y` / `N` - whether the hospital currently handles Category II cases.
      - `t3_median_wait` string, nullable — Category III (urgent) median wait (P50).
      - `t3_p95_wait` string, nullable — Category III 95th-percentile wait.
      - `t45_median_wait` string, nullable — Category IV/V (semi-urgent / non-urgent) median wait.
      - `t45_p95_wait` string, nullable — Category IV/V 95th-percentile wait.
  - `meta` SugraMeta, required — Metadata attached to every /api/v1/* response envelope.
    - `endpoint` string, required — Requested endpoint path.
    - `data_time` string, required — ISO 8601 UTC timestamp of the source data, not of the request.
    - `response_time` string, required — ISO 8601 UTC timestamp when this response was produced.
    - `provider` string, required — API name and version.
    - `source` string, nullable — Identifier of the primary upstream source used for this response.
    - `attribution` string, nullable — Human-readable attribution mandated by an upstream source (e.g. a securities regulator or self-regulatory organization). Present only on responses whose source requires the owner and source to be clearly identified. Do not remove or alter it when using the response.
    - `fallback_used` boolean, nullable — True when the primary source failed and a fallback produced the data.
    - `fallback_chain` string[], nullable — Ordered list of sources attempted, in the order they were tried.
    - `cached` boolean, nullable — True when this response was served from the internal cache.
    - `stale` boolean, nullable — True when the cached response was returned after the upstream rate-limited or errored. Clients can use this to detect degraded data.

## Other responses

- `401` — Missing or invalid `x-api-key` header. JSON body with a stable `code` distinguishing `missing_api_key` (no header sent) from `invalid_api_key` (header sent, key not accepted); any other 401 source carries the generic `unauthorized` with its detail as `reason`. Plus `hint`. `plan` is always null on 401 - an unauthenticated request has no plan; quota exhaustion is 429, not 401.
- `422` — Validation Error
- `429` — Daily rate limit exceeded. Check `X-RateLimit-Reset` for the next window.
- `503` — Upstream source is temporarily unavailable. Retry after a short delay.

---

[API](https://skmtc.net/sugra/apis/sugra-api.md) · [All operations](https://skmtc.net/sugra/apis/sugra-api/llms.txt) · [OpenAPI document](https://skmtc-service-staging.skmtc.workers.dev/v1/apis/sugra/sugra-api/versions/4c4530760ba1/schema)