Bendigo Community Health Services will receive $2.6 million in funding from the state government to build a centre for children's health. 

Health Minister David Davis visited Bendigo Community Health Services in Kangaroo Flat on Thursday to announce the grant. 

Acting chief executive of Bendigo Community Health Services, Anne Somerville, said staff were delighted that plans for a new "Kidzspace Children's Precinct" would come to fruition. 

"People were just overwhelmed with excitement and a sense of validation that we know this is so needed in central Victoria," Ms Somerville said.

The funding will pay for stage one of a five-stage plan that will see the ageing facility at Kangaroo Flat become a state-of-the-art location for treatment of children. 

The plan includes paediatric consulting suites, therapy rooms, a community kitchen, conference room, outside play areas and a community garden. 

Information technology and communications infrastructure will be part of the new facility to support e-health and telemedicine.

Ms Somerville said the $2.6 million would cover most of the cost, with Bendigo Community Health Services investing an additional $600,000. 

Plans for a new centre were developed by the organisation during the last two years.

Ms Somerville said the plans for a new facility were a reaction to years of unmet needs and wait lists of up to a year.

She said families were travelling to Melbourne to get treatment that should be locally available.

The new centre will be based at the Bendigo Community Health Services site at Kangaroo Flat and heralds a significant expansion of community children's health services for the Loddon Mallee region. 

Bendigo Community Health Services acting chief executive Anne Somerville said the new centre would strengthen the capacity of the organisation to treat children quickly, rather than placing them on a waiting list. 

"The earlier you do these interventions, the better," Ms Somerville said.

Health Minister David Davis said the Kidzspace Children's Precinct would complement a range of maternity and paediatric services at the new $630 million Bendigo Hospital. 

He said the centre would allow an "integrated approach" to children's services.

The $2.6 million grant will go toward the first stage of a five-stage development for the Kangaroo Flat site. 

Mr Davis did not mention further funding commitments for stages two to five of the facility. 

"Certainly there will be further steps in the future, but let's be clear, you've got to build stage one first," he said.

The funding comes from the government's Rural Capital Support Fund, which has given $56 million to regional and rural health facilities across four years. 

"There's certainly more work to do into the future but I'm very proud to have been involved with the Rural Capital Support Fund," Mr Davis said.