A group of surgeons at Alfred Health’s Sandringham Hospital are fighting a plan to turn the surgery unit into a state government rapid surgical hub aimed at clearing a backlog of tens of thousands of patients awaiting elective surgery, fearing the loss of their jobs and delays to patient treatment.
Plans to remodel Sandringham Hospital are part of a significant pre-election health pitch from the Andrews government in April to try to clear a backlog of more than 80,000 people awaiting elective surgery at Victorian hospitals.
Alfred Health’s Sandringham HospitalCredit:Wayne Taylor
The government has promised that if it is re-elected elective surgery would be cranked up to 125 per cent of pre-pandemic levels, with an extra 40,000 operations in 2023, building up to 240,000 every year from 2024.
As part of the plan, eight rapid access surgical hubs will be set up at Sandringham, Peter MacCallum, Barwon, St Vincent on Park, Broadmeadows, Heidelberg Repatriation, Royal Women’s Werribee Mercy hospitals.
Frankston Private Hospital will effectively be taken over by the state government to be run as public surgery centre, with the ability to handle up to 9000 public patients a year from 2023.
Loading
Local Liberal MP Brad Rowswell has raised in Parliament the surgeons’ concerns that a community hospital in Sandringham is “not fit for purpose to have an acute surgery unit” and that the group of nine surgeons were not guaranteed re-employment as part of the shake-up.
“The plan proposed has significant flaws; it is based on the transfer of sick patients who require urgent surgery from one campus to another,” the surgeons said to management in a letter seen by The Age.
“This is on basic principles dangerous, allowing delays in treatment, problems with handover and results, puts even more stress on Alfred theatres and is expensive.
Surgeons resist government plan for Sandringham Hospital
Source: Philippines Alive
