31 March 2005

Canberra Hospital provides services to Sydney patient

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Apparently a woman from Sydney was flown to Canberra yesterday to give birth because she needed a neonatal intensive care bed, and there were none in Sydney. Check out this ABC News story.

The official spokesperson comments are along the lines of “moving people around the system”. Seems a tad insensitive when you’re talking about the health of real people. Having a prem baby is stressful anyway, but being moved interstate to do it due to bed shortage would make it much worse. And I guess the family now has the problem that none of their relatives can visit unless they’re willing to do the three hour drive.

It also seems bizarre that Sydney’s health system is so underfunded for hospital beds that they have to resort to this. If Sydney are in this much trouble, how much worse is it for regional areas of NSW?

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Jo, it’s no different to when babies are moved to Sydney – either way it’s still a disgraceful state for the health system to be in. But I would expect that with more hospitals and more neonatal ICUs in Sydney, there would be an expectation that going to Canberra is far less likely than the other way round.

Also, having a baby 8 weeks prem is very serious. They have a good chance of survival – but it’s still a major problem. Prem babies at that stage may have difficulty breathing and will more than likely have great difficulty feeding properly. It’s all more stressful if the mother’s two older children (2 and 5) are unable to visit mum and see that she’s OK because they had to be left behind in Sydney.

Why is this any different to when babies are moved to sydney? Its just a matter of finding the best care avaliable at the time, Obvioult wasn’t anything to serious or they wouldn’t have bought the little one here, I also think you will find that ambulances can travel anywhere in nsw including the act without changing or stopping

Australia as whole is screaming for more neonatal facilities. Unfortunately the government seems to be preoccupied with the other end of the lifecycle at the moment. Apparently ols people can vote more effectively then an individual born a few premature. As raplh had said, fcuking disgrace.

There was a story last year about some woman from near Newcastle or something being sent down to MELBOURNE for the same reason.

What an absolute fucking disgrace.

She wasn’t flown mate, she had to go through four ambulances to get here. Why? Ambulances can only travel certain distances before seen as ‘out of zone’. Le Joke, as they say in France.

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