Dunedin Hospital's emergency department and the Dunedin Urgent Doctors and Accident Centre both had a busy morning yesterday, but there did not seem to be any particular cause.
A hospital duty manager said the number of people attending the emergency department had been steady over the holiday period, but about lunchtime yesterday numbers for the day had reached 40.
There did not appear to be any pattern to the visits, nor were more people than usual turning up who could have sought treatment elsewhere.
At the Dunedin Urgent Doctors and Accident Centre, the morning was also busy, with 24 patients seen in two and a-half hours.
Centre practice manager Belinda Watkins said while Christmas Day had been relatively quiet with only 56 patients, the following three days had been "pretty hectic".
Not many injuries appeared to be related to Christmas presents.
Some cases involved dressing wounds apparently incurred on Christmas Day but for which people had delayed seeking treatment until Boxing Day.
Many attendances involved treating medical conditions rather than dealing with the results of accidents, with patients using the centre because their general practitioner was on holiday.
The centre also provided treatment for quite a lot of out-of-town patients.
While on a normal day the centre would see between 80 and 100 patients, on Monday 130 patients were seen.
The record number of patients seen in a single day is 144.
Traditionally, it was one of the centre's two busiest times; the other being Easter, she said.
Mrs Watkins said she did not expect the situation to fully quieten down until all general practitioners were back at work, which was during the second week of January.
The centre's fracture clinic, which was open for a limited time on three days this week, was " absolutely full" on all three days, she said.
