Modbury Hospital faces another downgrade to emergency wing with special response unit set for cut

EXCLUSIVE: Modbury Hospital’s downgrade is set to continue, with confidential documents showing its emergency services face yet more watering down from April 3.

The Oppostion says the SA Government is struggling to maintain a downgraded Modbury Hospital.

• Modbury Hospital’s ED director quits over Transforming Health
• South Australian ED doctors attack Transforming Health changes
• Modbury and Lyell McEwin hospitals: Services cuts explained

MODBURY Hospital’s downgrade is set to continue, with confidential documents showing its emergency services face yet more watering down from April 3.

The Transforming Health changes, where urgent and complex cases are diverted to Lyell McEwin Hospital, has triggered a move to dump a stand-alone 24/7 emergency response team, internal SA Health documents seen by The Advertiser reveal.

The Medical Emergency Team (MET) attends to patients already treated in the hospital who suddenly deteriorate, including those needing resuscitation, and previously was led by the Intensive Care Unit team.

However, the ICU role ceased to exist on February 6 but the MET was kept going using locums.

At present, Modbury has a 24/7 MET staffed by a senior doctor, nurse, duty medical registrar and intern, with the senior doctor role consisting of two 12-hour shifts a day.

In a briefing paper proposing changes, officials say the cost is not viable.

They also say since the Transforming Health changes, Modbury only experiences on average one MET call per day — usually lasting about an hour.

But they concede the hospital will continue to need some kind of 24/7 response because it will still have patients in wards at risk of acute deterioration.

One proposed alternative is to replace the MET service with a “rapid response team” staffed from the ED roster, potentially resulting in senior ED doctors being sent elsewhere in the hospital.

Modbury Hospital’s stand-alone 24/7 emergency response team is set to be watered down.

Another is a two-tier system depending on the severity of the emergency, also using existing staff. Both options would come at no additional cost.

Opposition health spokesman Stephen Wade said any move to have senior ED staff

leave their own patients and be busy for hours elsewhere in the hospital “is outrageous and dangerous”.

“The proposal has been met with a wall of protest from Modbury emergency physicians, who already work in a more risky environment since the first downgrade,” he said.

“The MET team is called out on a daily basis at Modbury.

“The fact Labor is struggling to maintain a downgraded hospital with a downgraded ED is raising real concerns that after the next election a Labor Government would remove the remaining acute services from Modbury.”

Northern Adelaide Local Health Network chief executive Jackie Hanson said: “Feedback closed on Friday and we are considering all feedback and options. Importantly, no matter where the MET service is based, Modbury Hospital will continue to have an emergency response team and after-hours service in place with senior doctors and nurses available 24/7.”

Modbury Hospital is in the seat of Florey, now held by Labor’s Frances Bedford, but Health Minister Jack Snelling is planning to switch to that seat at the next election after a boundary redraw.