Dubbo Western Cancer Centre: First patient finishes treatment
Cancer patients who previously had to travel hours for treatment are now getting care closer to home with a life-changing $35 million centre at Dubbo Hospital.
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Western NSW cancer patients who were previously forced to travel hours for treatment are now getting care closer to home, thanks to the opening of a life-changing $35 million centre at Dubbo Hospital.
Wellington grandfather Tracey Brown was the first patient to be treated at the Western Cancer Centre and on Wednesday where he completed his final bout of radiation treatment for prostate cancer.
“Originally this wasn’t functioning, I had to go to Orange when Dubbo was first in lockdown,” the 80-year-old said of his initial treatment following diagnosis during the Covid outbreak.
“Once I got down there, I wasn’t allowed to come home because I’d have come back here to a locked down area. I would have had to have a fortnight quarantine.”
Mr Brown was grateful to hear he could be treated closer to home because the centre had opened and offered the radiation treatment he needed in Dubbo for the first time.
“I just come in and out everyday now,” he said.
“You wouldn’t even know anything was happening, you just lay there dead still and five minutes later they come in and say ‘you’re all right’.
“They were so fantastic … they just make you feel as if you’ve known them for years. You don’t know what you’re in for when you first come in, they’re all just so beautiful I love them all.”
Mr Brown, who is now awaiting the hopeful final all-clear from his specialists, told of his experience when Parkes federal Nationals MP Mark Coulton and Regional Health Minister David Gillespie visited the centre for the first time.
The federal government injected $25 million to make the centre a reality, while the state government chipped in $10 million following a grassroots community campaign which saw a petition attract more than 45,000 signatures calling for the centre to be established.
Mr Coulton said seeing the centre for the first time made him appreciate how it would make a difference to the lives of residents across western NSW.
“My mother passed away at the age of 67 from cancer, I’ve lost a sister to bowel cancer,” he said.
“Having seen the experience of my mother … being transferred into the air ambulance, being away from her family in Sydney having treatment, I know what this means and I’m not unique.
“The technical ability, the clinical ability and the machinery in this place is as good as anywhere in the world and that’s what going to save the lives of people in western NSW.”
Mr Coulton said with the centre standing alongside the $306 million redevelopment of Dubbo Hospital, and other services like the Royal Flying Doctor Service and University of Sydney medical school, Dubbo had now become a health hub to service more than 200,000 people in western NSW.
“Apart from all the magnificent machines, the highlight of my visit has been talking to the young health professionals that have actually relocated to Dubbo to provide the services to the people of the west,” he said.
“Fifty-nine more people have been employed this year, rather than having to drag them kicking and screaming, people are actually looking to come here because they’re going to be working in the most modern facility anywhere in Australia.”
In addition to face-to-face services, the centre offers patients in small rural communities access to remote video assisted chemotherapy where a nurse in Dubbo works with counterpart in a smaller hospital like Coonabarabran or Cobar, to deliver treatment to patients in their local hospitals.
During their visit, Mr Coulton and Dr Gillespie were able to see a cancer patient from Hermidale receiving chemo at Cobar Hospital with the support of a nurse in Dubbo.
“Already in its early weeks there are numerous people having treatment here that would have otherwise been driving to Orange or flying to Sydney,” Mr Coulton said.
“Particularly with Aboriginal residents, they’ve mostly got a family connection in Dubbo, so coming to Dubbo is doable, going to Sydney is just not on.
“One of the reason why the life expectancy in western NSW is lower than the cities is because sometimes the treatment is just too hard.”
Dr Gillespie, who started his career as a resident in Dubbo in the 1980s, said the centre would improve health outcomes in western NSW.
“In the lottery of life we get cancer, it’s part of being human but this means you can stay local, you don’t get your family dislocated, you don’t have to travel backwards and forwards to Newcastle or Sydney or elsewhere,” he said.
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