A FORMER Goulburn Base surgeon has added his weight to calls for a new hospital.
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Dr Jarvis Hayman, now retired, was a consulting surgeon at the facility for 25 years.
In a letter published in today’s Goulburn Post, Mr Hayman said “bits and pieces” added on over the years had made treating patients with modern standards of care increasingly difficult.
“For many years over holiday periods, some of the busiest periods of the year for surgical casualties, the surgeons were forced to operate in a minor operating theatre so small that the analogy of being too small to swing a cat comes to mind,” he writes.
“This was ostensibly to give staff time off during holiday periods and to redecorate the main theatre block but in reality was designed to allow health authorities to save money, to the detriment of good patient care.”
Even now, a newly renovated theatre block left “a lot to be desired” in terms of patient care and handling.”
This was principally due to a lack of consultation with clinicians working in the hospital and bureaucrats and politicians deciding what was best.
“The specialists working at the hospital have over the years, had to fight in the face of bureaucratic hostility, for any new innovative service; the introduction of colonoscopy services, of laparoscopic surgery and obstetric ultrasound services come readily to mind,” Mr Hayman stated.
“A recent comment by a politician that the opinion of doctors in Goulburn over the years has been dismissed as simply being self-serving epitomises the problem.”
Last week, obstetrician Dr Sujon Purkayastha told the Post it was a waste of time and money to build onto the existing hospital.
He maintained this was the overwhelming view of doctors and medical staff.
“We don’t want an infirmary from last century but a hospital for the new century,” he said.
The state government in January allocated $600,000 towards planning for an upgrade. The first stage of planning is expected to be completed later this year. Last week, Health Minister Jillian Skinner did not rule out a Greenfield site.
But this is not Mayor Geoff Kettle or Goulburn MP Pru Goward’s understanding.
Ms Goward said planners preferred the current location.
“We’re very lucky,” she said.
“Yes, parts of the hospital are old but it’s the perfect place near town, the ambulance station and residents. We’d be silly to put it anywhere else.”
She believed there was ample land to redevelop and said while usually Greenfield sites were cheaper, in this case, it would be significantly less to upgrade on the existing property due to its staging.
Ms Goward later qualified her stance, saying that if there was a groundswell of opinion against the current site’s upgrade, then she, Ms Skinner and Southern NSW Health District CEO, Dr Max Alexander would have to consider this. She encouraged clinicians to meet with Dr Alexander.
Asked about the chances of scoring redevelopment money following federal cutbacks to state funding in the recent budget, Ms Goward said it was a reduction in the allocation’s rate of growth, not in “real terms.”
“I didn’t realise this when I came to office but Goulburn ranks towards the top of the state in terms of a new hospital but for one reason and another we have always been bumped down the list,” she said
“There is a real recognition that Goulburn needs a new hospital.”
Ms Goward told the Post a funding partnership with a private party was not out of the question.
EDITORIAL: Speak up
