Margie Maccoll
A long-term lease agreement with Noosa Hospital, more control by local hospital boards, more staff and more hospital beds are priorities of an LNP government, if elected, says Shadow Health and Ambulance Minister Ros Bates who spoke to Noosa Today on Monday.
On a visit in support of LNP Noosa state candidate Clare Stewart, Ms Bates admitted it was “a huge mountain to climb“ for LNP to win government with 14 new seats needed in addition to incumbent LNP seats, but she believes there’s a mood for change, with people sending them messages of “genuine anger and concern, particularly around health and youth crime“.
“I think we’ve had four Labor Health Ministers, none of which have tried to heal the health crisis,“ she said.
“Queensland Health is a giant organisation. You really need to ask what’s wrong and ask the right questions, that’s been the problem.“
After a career of about 40 years of health experience as a registered nurse, hospital administrator and developing health policy, Ms Bates is well versed in the workings of the health industry and continues to gain first hand accounts of operations by conducting “ride alongs“ with senior operations ambulance crews.
She plans to complete a 10 hour night duty ride along with the Sunshine Coast crew, having last week completed a six hour ride along shift in Rockhampton and recently accompanying a LifeFlight operation.
“I get to meet staff in ED. I can talk to them as a fellow RN, about what it’s really like,“ she said.
“It’s welcomed by staff that an MP gives up their time to see what they do.
“They are incredible, but they’re frustrated, babysitting people on ramps. They’re emergency services needed to respond, stabilise and transport, not babysit.
“In the (Princess Alexandra Hospital) they have permanent ramps. Patients are offloaded from ambulances to trolleys but looked after by paramedics.
“They give me lots of different ideas about how things can be improved.“
She said an LNP government would introduce real time data monitoring in the first 100 days to show what’s happening in Emergency Departments (ED), as occurs in NSW, to provide a clearer picture of ambulance bay availability and expected ramping times.
Across the state ambulance ramping is at an average of 40 per cent including at Nambour Hospital and 33 per cent at Sunshine Coast University Hospital (SCUH), she said.
“If all patients in SCUH are ramped, and there’s no room in Nambour, if your father’s having a heart attack you’ll be waiting longer for ambulance,“ she said.
“The longer you are sitting on a trolley the more likely your outcome is less than if you had been seen in time.“
Ms Bates believes it’s important to return greater control of local health needs to hospital and health service boards governed by local representatives.
“There’s 16 hospital boards in Queensland. All run differently,“ she said. “What’s needed in Noosa is different to what’s need in the ED in Emerald.
“What’s important is listening to people on the ground, working out how people get into hospital, how they get out, having services to back them up in the community, looking after them holistically.
“You don’t do total hip (operation) on 85-yr-old Pearl who lives in a three-storey walk-up and discharge her on Friday when the family is overseas. You need to make sure everything is in place.“
Ms Bates said the government had failed to look to the future in building hospitals with too few beds, satellite hospitals that closed at 10pm were not the answer for bed shortages needed by acute patients and more needed to be done to obtain and retain staff.
“We see staff continuing to work double shifts and they’ve just had enough. We’re seeing people with 40-50 years of nursing experience walk out the door. I’ve had two members of my family do it,“ she said.
Regarding Noosa Hospital, Ms Bates and Ms Stewart met with Acting CEO of the Ramsay Health Care-owned hospital on Monday, Ms Bates said LNP would commit to extending the land lease on the hospital, giving them surety for expansion.
“Ramsay have six years left on their lease. They can’t and won’t invest for critical infrastructure until they have security of tenure, a longer lease,“ Ms Stewart said.
Ms Stewart planned on Monday to launch a petition to request the government extend their lease, to give certainty to Ramsay Health for a longterm plan for growth to provide services needed at Noosa.
“It enables them to hire the staff. If you don’t have continuity of tenure you’re less likely to have doctors stay or come if you want to attract specialties to area.
“Ramsay want to invest.“
Ms Bates said government needs to work with the private sector. “You can’t just lean on them when elective surgery numbers are blown out,“ she said.
“Increasing the number of public patients is something we’d negotiate with Ramsay.
“If Ramsay has security, everything can be on the table to open up those opportunities. We didn’t talk about maternity but they are very keen to open other services.“
Ms Stewart said Noosa’s ED which is open to public and private patients is the busiest on the Sunshine Coast, seeing about 24,000 patients a year.
Last June transitional demountable buildings were installed at the hospital to triage patients as part of ensuring the Emergency Department operates as efficiently as possible whilst Ramsay continue negotiations with State Government for an expansion.
A recent application by Noosa Hospital to expand services on a Ramsay owned property adjoining the hospital was refused by Noosa Council due to it being zoned residential. The matter is now being appealed in the Planning and Environment Court.
Noosa Independent MP Sandy Bolton met recently with the Queensland Minister for Health Shannon Fentiman and Noosa Hospital CEO to understand what barriers to this permanent expansion exist. “With Ramsay Health appealing Noosa Council’s decision to reject their application to utilise a property adjacent to the hospital in order to move the renal and oncology operations to facilitate the needed expansion in the existing building, this has become complex,“ she posted on her Noosa 360 site.
