Central Queensland maternity crisis ‘a medical emergency that should not be happening’ says AMAQ

AMAQ president Dr Maria Boulton has lashed Queensland Health’s “lack of planning, resources and funding” over Gladstone Hospital’s ongoing maternity bypass problems.

The ongoing central Queensland maternity crisis is “a medical emergency that should not be happening” and the blame lies squarely with the state health system’s “lack of planning, leadership, resources and funding”, the Australian Medical Association Queensland says.

AMAQ president Dr Maria Boulton said the crisis began in 2018 when Gladstone’s private maternity service run by Mercy Health and Aged Care Queensland closed, and this was compounded by the public hospitals in Gladstone and Biloela later going on birthing bypass.

Her comments came before Acting Premier Steven Miles announced that an urgent meeting will be held today between State Health Minister Yvette D’Ath and Queensland Health Director-General Shaun Drummond to review Gladstone Hospital’s ongoing maternity bypass and investigate what is needed to have it taken off bypass.

It comes after The Sunday Mail reported expectant mums from Gladstone were afraid to make the 100-kilometre drive to Rockhampton to give birth and are demanding C-sections in Gladstone to avoid potential roadside births between Gladstone and Rockhampton.

Gladstone Hospital.

Dr Boulton said the maternity crisis in Gladstone should not be happening in a city of 60,000 people with roughly 600 births a year.

“What we see time and time again is a lack of planning, a lack of leadership, a lack of resources and funding and this ever pressing need for the workforce,” Dr Boulton said, speaking on RN Breakfast with Hamish Macdonald on Monday.

“And the situation in Gladstone, we travelled there last year, we spoke to women who’d had to go through having a baby during the bypass. They were in tears.

“(Bypass) means that women can’t safely deliver in those hospitals. So if you are pregnant and due to have a baby in say, February, you will have to deliver that baby in Rockhampton.

“The worst thing you can have when you’re pregnant – I mean, it’s already a stressful time – is the lack of certainty as to where you’re going to deliver your baby.

“They were told very little until about 37 weeks when they were told that they would have to travel to Rockhampton, and it was a very stressful time.”

Greens Senator Penny Allman-Payne, who lives in Gladstone, said she had personal experience with the local maternity problems.

“My elder daughter actually was a high-risk pregnancy three years ago, and she couldn’t get the care that she needed then,” Ms Allman-Payne told RN Breakfast with Hamish Macdonald on Monday.

“Knowing that she couldn’t get the care that she needed, she had to move away from Gladstone. And so she’s been away for three-and-a-half years while she has her family, and she’s only just come back.

“But we have women here who are having to leave because they are pregnant. That is an untenable decision for women to have to make.”

Greens Queensland Senator Penny Allman-Payne Senator speaking in Parliament House in Canberra in August. Photo: NCA NewsWire / Gary Ramage.

Ms Allman-Payne said recruiting staff to the area was part of the problem, but health issues were putting people off moving to the area.

“I was a teacher at the high school here until six months ago when I was elected,” she said.

“I can tell you now that we have difficulty attracting teachers to Gladstone because young women know that they can’t birth safely here. And if they transfer here and they want to start a family, they can’t do that.”

Mr Miles said on Sunday reinforcements had been recruited for central Queensland.

“We’re recruiting more obstetricians. We’ve appointed four new obstetricians into the Central Queensland Hospital and Health Service, and as they take up those positions we’ll be able to deliver more maternity services throughout that region,” he said.

“It’s been very challenging to recruit maternity staff into Gladstone.

“We already have very attractive packages for our medical professionals. I suspect that now that we can recruit more easily from overseas we’ll be able to fill some of those positions.”