RELATED: Funds to cut surgery wait
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Travelling to Melbourne for surgery will be “extremely rare” once the new Bendigo hospital opens, Bendigo Health has said.
Board chair Bob Cameron said the 11 new operating theatres would be world-class and would enable most surgeries to be performed within the community.
The existing hospital has five theatres and one endoscopy suite.
“At the moment we are limited by capacity,” general surgeon Manny Cao said.
Each theatre can accommodate two sessions a day.
“What I've seen in my time since moving here in 2013 is an increase in the needs of the population, as well as increased population growth,” Mr Cao said.
“We can’t really cater for that at the present time, so having that increased capacity allows us to effectively decrease that waiting list and allows patients more access to surgery.”
There were 1140 people on the elective surgery waiting list as at the end of last year, an increase of 76 on December 2014.
Mr Cao said most of the state-of-the-art equipment purchased for the new theatres was brand new.
“My ability to offer things like keyhole surgery for patients who traditionally would go to Melbourne for a lot of their bowel cancer surgery is now effectively achieved here,” he said.
He and his fellow surgeons have been heavily involved in the project, from the design of the theatre complex to the equipment purchased.
“Most of us have been involved in the process of acquiring those instruments, so they are all catered to the needs of our surgeons here,” Mr Cao said.
“The anesthetists have increased monitoring facilities and have been involved in a similar process as well.”
Other features of the new theatre complex include a fully integrated patient monitoring system that will allow doctors and nurses to see a patient’s vital signs from remote areas, a three-stage recovery area and improved infection control.
“An exclusive patient elevator that will service theatres, intensive care, maternity and the emergency department will also result in improved patient flow and treatment for critically ill patients,” Mr Cameron said.
Interventional suite senior manager Sasha Vedelsby said the throughput had increased from 8000 patients a year to 12,000 in the past 10 years.
“We are now at capacity, so if we can secure some funding to open more theatres, that will be very exciting,” she said.
The $630 million new hospital project is on track to open at the end of January.
Surgeons and media toured the new theatre complex on Tuesday.
Bendigo Health chief executive officer John Mulder said the announcement gave some certainty about preparations for the move to the new hospital, including recruiting more staff.
Mr Cao is one of 30 surgeons in Bendigo.
