Ongoing turf war over cardiac services forcing pregnant women to give birth at Westmead

An ongoing feud over cardiac services between Sydney’s two children’s hospitals has forced women needing caesarean sections to go to The Children’s Hospital Westmead so their babies can get immediate cardiac care.

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Women have been forced to have caesareans at a children’s hospital, rather than an adult hospital, as a result of a feud over cardiac services.

Royal Hospital for Women obstetrician Lucy Bower said women whose unborn babies were diagnosed with a cardiac issue used to give birth at RHW and then the ­babies were taken “across the corridor” to Sydney Children’s Hospital.

Now those mums-to-be are sent to The Children’s Hospital Westmead to give birth.

Women whose unborn babies are diagnosed with a cardiac issue are sent to The Children’s Hospital Westmead to give birth. Picture: iStock

“It does risk women’s safety, you really should not be looking after pregnant women and delivering them in a children’s hospital,” she said.

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But Professor David Winlaw, Head of Paediatric Cardiothoracic Surgery at Sydney Children’s Hospital Network, denied women were put at any added risk: “We are only delivering ­babies who without immediate surgical treatment will die in minutes.

Cardiac surgeon Professor David Winlaw. Picture: Tim Hunter

“Deliveries are in a theatre adjacent to where the baby is taken to have surgery. There have been no mat­ernal complications in the seven cases managed this way.”

Meanwhile, the newly elected Chair of the Sydney Children’s Hospital Medical Staff Council has called for the Randwick-based hospital to leave the Sydney Children’s Hospital Network.

Dr Michael Solomon said SCH continues to be let down by the network, which oversees the Children’s Hospital Westmead as well.

The tussle over cardiac resources between the two hospitals, which were combined in 2010, has resulted in cardiac services being stripped from Randwick.

“The current structure has failed Randwick, we want to be back to the way we were before with our own management and cardiac surgery department,” he said.

Dr Solomon, who has been threatened with disciplinary action for speaking out, said the failure of anyone in NSW Health to “take responsibility” for the ­decision had left the hospital in limbo.

Originally published as Ongoing turf war over cardiac services forcing pregnant women to give birth at Westmead