news, latest-news

Canberra's Centenary Hospital for Women and Children is facing concerns that staff are having to work extra shifts and overtime to meet increasing workloads with the facility reportedly under pressure from growing demand. The union representing nurses and midwives has received a number of "critical incident" notices about concerns relating staffing numbers, the high number of patients needing care and the staffing skill mix at the hospital. The number of babies born at Canberra Hospital has surged by about 24 per cent between 2010-11 and 2014-15. Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation ACT branch secretary Jenny Miragaya said the union was conducting site visits and having discussions with ACT health around staff concerns. "We've had rumblings from Women's and Children's for at least six months," she said. She said the health directorate had been "open to hearing" the issues raised by staff and the union. "At this stage, we're still fact gathering and trying to support our members because there is certainly a degree of stress and anxiety," she said. "Certainly we understand from members they are working considerably hard and they're working additional shifts, extra shifts and overtime to try and meet the workload. ACT Health met with ANMF earlier this week around maternity demand. The latest concerns facing the hospital have been slammed by opposition leader Jeremy Hanson who said it was "unacceptable mothers and babies were being put at risk by a dysfunctional culture and lack of staff and beds at the Canberra Hospital". "Unfortunately these dire circumstances are typical of ACT Labor's neglect of the health system over 15 years," he said. "Under a Canberra Liberals government, I will fix our health system; making it bigger, better and smarter for all of Canberra. "The Canberra Hospital badly needs attention and only a change of government in October will allow that to happen." Health Minister Simon Corbell said the safety and wellbeing of women and their babies would always be the main priority for staff at the hospital. "Since the Centenary Hospital for Women and Children opened, there has been a significant increase in women giving birth at the Canberra Hospital," he told The Canberra Times. "This can be attributed to the high standard of clinical care and new state-of-the-art facilities." Ms Miragaya said the increase in births at the hospital put "huge amounts of pressure on both the provision of services and for the staff who are trying to provide the services". She also raised concerns about the flow-on effects of the high level of maternity demand at the hospital and the expectation that mothers could home within 24 hours of giving birth. "We are also hearing from our members in the maternal and child health sector that they are having considerable issues with regards to the number of home visits that they are required to provide and the number of service provisions they need to provide so that the mothers in the community actually access the level of skill and care they require post-natally," she said. Mr Corbell said women and babies would only be discharged within 24 hours when it was appropriate and clinically safe to do so and no woman was discharged if there were any identified risks to them or their baby. Mr Corbell said ACT Health had regular meetings with the union and would continue to do so and address any concerns as they arose. "ACT Health will continue to work with Calvary Health Care and Queanbeyan Hospital to develop ways to manage the service demand and promote the choice of maternity services available across the ACT and surrounding region," he said. The government also this week announced the first publicly-funded home birth trial, which Mr Corbell said would give Canberra women more choice when having their baby.

https://nnimgt-a.akamaihd.net/transform/v1/crop/frm/silverstone-ct-migration/ce83c378-3dea-4c2a-9e88-f9bc6f35ea4b/r0_86_1000_651_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg