‘Overwhelmed by demand’: Mildura Hospital’s dire warning for Allan government

The board of Mildura Hospital has lashed out at the Allan government over its lack of funding to expand bed capacity at the regional health service and says it “can no longer meet the growing demand” from patients.

The intervention comes after this masthead revealed that hundreds of patients at Mildura Hospital have been languishing in the emergency department for more than 24 hours, with scores waiting 48 hours and one 85-year-old woman dying.

Linda Romeo’s mother died after a lengthy wait in the emergency department of Mildura Hospital in March.Credit: Ian McKenzie

Mildura Base Public Hospital chair Frank Piscioneri said he was frustrated by the situation, and there had been “no meaningful progress” with the government despite the board repeatedly meeting ministers and representatives.

“Our capacity challenges are becoming more urgent by the day,” he said.

“The reality is that our hospital can no longer meet the growing demand from the communities we serve. We’ve been raising this issue for more than five years. Until our infrastructure needs are addressed, pressure on our people and services will only continue to mount.”

He praised the dedication, professionalism and compassion of the hospital’s 1250 staff members, who he said delivered outstanding care under difficult circumstances.

Mildura Hospital was operated as a public hospital under a private management contract with Ramsay Health until 2020, when it was taken over by the state Labor government.

Since transitioning to public management, the hospital has completed a service plan, master plan and emergency department planning, but none of these proposals have received government funding to be realised. The government-funded master plan has never been made public.

The hospital in the state’s north-west serves a growing population across Victoria, South Australia and NSW. About 34,000 patients arrive at its emergency department every year.

A health source who spoke on the condition of anonymity said an additional 16 cubicles were needed in the emergency department and 30 extra beds across other wards.

The comments from the board coincide with the Australian Medical Association (AMA) demanding urgent intervention from the Allan government to fix the “dysfunction” crippling regional health services.

In his first move as AMA Victoria president, Dr Simon Judkins wrote to Health Minister Mary-Anne Thomas this week to call for reforms and ongoing investment to improve bed capacity, workforce shortages and a lack of timely discharge options.

He wrote that the issues highlighted in The Age’s report were “symptoms of access block and broader system dysfunction that have long impacted hospitals across Victoria, particularly in rural and regional areas”.

“We cannot afford to accept this as normal, nor allow these pressures to deepen further,” said Judkins, who works as a director at a regional hospital’s emergency department.

Judkins said that many regional hospitals still relied on paper records and fax-based communications, which prolonged patient stays by delaying the flow of information such as patients’ medical history.

One Mildura Hospital health worker, who did not want to be identified because she was not authorised to speak publicly, said she saw patients deteriorating every day due to their lengthy stays in the emergency department.

“I have watched elderly people with minor illnesses be driven to delirium due to being stuck in a bed, or worse still, on a hard trolley, not seeing daylight for days, not receiving proper food or personal care,” she said.

She said that in one confronting case, an elderly woman started hallucinating after spending more than 48 hours in the emergency department.

“[S]he was convinced the staff were intruders in her home,” the health worker said.

“When I was talking to her, trying to comfort her and de-escalate her, I looked into her eyes and all I could see was fear. We had done this to her.”

On Friday, Nationals MP for Mildura Jade Benham grilled Health Infrastructure Minister Melissa Horne and Department of Health secretary Jenny Atta about the unreleased master plan for Mildura Hospital at a Labor-led parliamentary committee. Horne and Atta could not say when the master plan would be released or what the capacity of the hospital should be.

“The community in Mildura are desperate to get the emergency care they deserve so that people are no longer dying in hallways,” said Benham.

A state government spokesman said that since returning Mildura Base Hospital to public hands, the Labor government had delivered more than $30 million in upgrades including a new paediatric unit, negative pressure room and expanded intensive care unit.

“This year’s budget delivered the biggest investment in Victoria’s health system ever – increasing bed capacity, backing our health workforce and investing in the digital systems regional hospitals need to support faster, safer care,” he said.

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