IT was a photo that said a lot about the future of public health care on the Border.
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A new health boss, wearing a hard hat, on top of the now under construction $70 million Albury Wodonga Regional Cancer Centre.
Albury Wodonga Health chief executive Sue O’Neill joined the now already former Victorian health minister David Davis on a tour of the site in late October.
They got a very clear idea of what would be apparent to anybody heading down Borella Road — and that is the substantial progress being made on the project.
Professor O’Neill has joined Albury
Wodonga Health just as the area has started to see some big runs on the board in 2014.
The cancer centre is probably the most apparent thanks to its sheer size and scope, and no doubt excitement will build as the project rapidly moves to its late 2015 completion.
When he bowed out of the job in late August, Professor O’Neill’s predecessor Stuart Spring remarked on just how radically different Albury Wodonga Health was compared with when he started in the job five years ago.
The organisation as of 2014, he said, had secured recognition from governments in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra as “a major regional health service” delivering care to more than 200,000 people.
The key point, he said, was that the area was no longer seen as merely two small hospitals serving what were two relatively small communities.
And the growth curve would continue to rise at an even greater rate.
Dr Spring envisaged that could result
in the need for a complete rebuild of Wodonga hospital within the next 10 to 15 years. That type of growth in demand was very much on Dr O’Neill’s mind when she took over — in fact, she said keeping pace with this would be her No.1 priority.
Another challenge, she said, was transforming the way health care was delivered on the Border to cope with the growing pressures created by an ageing population.
The cancer centre might the most obvious, though it’s not the only win for Border health this year.
In July came news that mental health services on either side of the river had united.
That came with the transfer of services from the Murrumbidgee Local Health District to Albury Wodonga Health.
The big positive of the move was most clearly put by Albury MP Greg Aplin: “No matter what side of the river you’re on, rest assured you will get the services you need.”
Other positives for health care have included the NSW government’s announcement of a $3 million brain health centre for the Border and the redevelopment of Albury Wodonga Health’s new parents and baby unit.
Challenges still abound for the Border’s public health. At the top of the list is a new Albury hospital emergency ward, something Mr Aplin has been pushing for though has cautioned on the need for patience, as progress will be slow.
Another unknown comes with the federal government’s decision to axe Medicare Locals. Concern has been raised about the government’s new primary health networks and how the resulting state-by-state carve-up will impact on the cross-border Albury Wodonga Health.
