Health emergency

BASS Coast Health is looking to attract State Government support to the tune of $10 million to relocate the emergency department.
Wonthaggi Hospital patients have had difficulty accessing the emergency department in its current location at the back of the building.
The need for a relocated emergency department is more critical than ever, with the hospital seeing a record breaking 1073 patients during the last peak summer period.
Although no election promises have been made, Victorian Opposition Leader Matthew Guy toured the hospital last Tuesday, September 12.
Mr Guy said the emergency department needed to be relocated to the front of the building.
“The emergency department is at the wrong end of the hospital and it is a rabbit warren. While it is a good hospital, they are doing a huge amount of work with limited resources,” he said.
“I really can’t praise highly enough the staff of the hospital. They are obviously working as hard as they can and it’s difficult in some of the conditions when they have demand that doubles over summer.
“With just six bays in the emergency department, they do the best they can with the resources available.”
Mr Guy said the hospital now needs government support to keep up with the increasing population.
“I’d say Bass Coast is one of the fastest growing shires outside of Melbourne. It has got a huge population projection boom ahead of it. We can’t ignore this area. If the services are not updated, we won’t be ready for this growth,” he said.
“That’s why $10 million to do this job now is a better investment than paying $40 million in 20 years when the population would’ve increased exponentially. It makes better financial sense to back the hospital when they’re asking.”
A spokesperson from Minister for Health Jill Hennessey’s office said the State Government continued to work with hospitals to address demand and cost pressures.
“Bass Coast Health alone received, in this year’s budget, $43.9 million – up 14.1 per cent from last year or $5.4 million. That’s a whopping 36.6 per cent or $11.7 million more than they did under the former Liberal Government’s last budget,” they said.
Mr Guy congratulated the hospital’s management and board for developing its master plan.
“They’ve got a lot of land, so they have been able to optimise what they are going to do with the site,” he said.

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Posted by Jessica Anstice on Sep 19 2017. Filed under Featured, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry