Westmead Hospital still without a palliative care unit
Terminally ill patients at the state’s largest hospital are still without a designated palliative care unit.
Parramatta
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A cancer advocacy group is renewing calls for Westmead Hospital to have a designated unit for terminally ill patients.
The push also comes as the findings from a report about palliative care are still to be released almost a year after it was submitted.
Western Sydney Cancer Action Network’s James Butler said dying patients required specialised nursing but were now being treated alongside cancer patients.
“It’s really not acceptable practise,’’ he said.
“The oncology patients are in there with some kind of hope and the palliative care patients need privacy and it’s a different kind of nursing for palliative care … we need something to happen now.’’
The designated palliative care unit at Westmead Hospital — the state’s largest — closed 10 years ago.
Mr Butler said plans were earmarked for the unit as part of the hospital’s upgrade but “now it looks like there’s nothing happen then with the redevelopment”.
“I think it’s ridiculous for a hospital the size of Westmead and the population it’s supposed to look after not to have a palliative care unit,’’ he said.
The network said the Western Sydney Local Health District commissioned an independent consultant to prepare a report, Palliative and End of Life Care Planning for the Future, which it submitted last November.
But Western Sydney Local Health District did not respond to questions about the report’s results.
A health district spokeswoman said the hospital had enlisted the services of palliative care provider Silver Chain to care for patients in their home.
“The service enables people to decide where they would like to spend the end of their lives,’’ the spokeswoman said.
“Palliative and supportive care continues to be provided at Westmead Hospital, where an extensive $3.8 million refurbishment to the cancer and haematology ward was completed in 2017.
“Under the refurbishment the ward was remodelled to create more single rooms, ensuring the area is suitable and appropriate for both cancer and palliative care patients.”
She said the district, which includes Mt Druitt and St Joseph’s at Auburn, would receive eight palliative care nurses over the next four years.
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