Albany Health Campus—Special care nursery
Brief ministerial statement
Ms Meredith Hammat (Girrawheen—Minister for Health) (12:21 pm): I rise today to inform the house about the new specialist care nursery now operational at Albany Health Campus. This important investment in regional health is part of a $4.1 million Cook Labor government commitment to care for babies that would otherwise have been transported to Perth after their birth.
Great Southern residents have recently benefited from a new state-of-the-art radiation oncology facility, the expansion of mental health crisis services for children and adolescents, and an increase to the Patient Assisted Travel Scheme's fuel subsidy.
I recently had the opportunity to visit the newly opened nursery in Albany and meet the dedicated staff working there. They told me that the nursery had already been put to good use, with the first patient being a premature baby who had previously been transferred to Perth for care but was now able to return home to Albany along with Mum, close to their family and support networks.
The new nursery has doubled capacity to four beds and is equipped to care for babies born from 34 weeks, as well as newborns with complex health issues. This means that Great Southern families with babies born preterm will be able to stay closer to home. The nursery will also allow for an earlier repatriation of preterm babies who require initial care in Perth, bringing them home sooner.
Albany Health Campus's workforce has also been bolstered, with additional registered nurses working alongside the midwives and paediatricians who staff the nursery. More than 550 babies from Albany and surrounding areas are born at Albany Health Campus every year, but until now preterm babies born before 37 weeks gestation needed to be transferred to Perth for treatment in those fragile early weeks.
The Cook Labor government recognises the unique challenges faced by regional Western Australians in accessing health services, and we are proud to be delivering the services we need to ensure that all Western Australians, even our tiniest ones, have access to care closer to home.
