News

Rostering arrangements a safer model for mums and babies

Thu, 26 Mar 2020 03:28:00

Mildura Base Hospital changes to rostering arrangements in the hospital’s Maternity Unit are providing a safer environment and model of care for mothers and babies.

A Ramsay spokesperson for the hospital said that the new arrangements introduced in December ensured that a senior doctor is providing continuous oversight on the quality of services and patient care in the unit.
“These changes provide a more holistic, accessible and continuous model of care, allowing our senior medical staff to be present on the maternity ward, working closely with mothers and the maternity care team.
“The dedicated presence of a senior doctor to the inpatient unit during business hours, ensures more support and supervision for our junior doctors, and a faster response time to emergency situations during a woman’s labour. This will also provide more time for our senior doctors to do extra quality assurance activities in maternity, which allows for a continuous improvement in our service provision.
“Mothers and families in our community can be confident that our Obstetrics and Gynaecology Services are of the highest standard.”
The spokesperson said that they were disappointed at the recent criticism from two Mildura obstetricians about the new arrangements.
“A decision was made by Dr Sleeman & Dr Hughes in last year, without any consultation with the hospital, to advise that they would no longer be able to offer appointments for public antenatal patients. Due to this decision, the hospital immediately sought to employ additional resources and make alternative arrangements for our patients.
“We immediately began to recruit the extra resources needed to ensure the provision of Obstetric services for our public patients wasn’t impacted, and we also began reviewing our arrangements for obstetrics and gynecology inpatient services.”
A successful recruitment campaign resulted in a full complement of staff O & G Consultants.
“The new senior doctor maternity unit roster commenced in December 2019, and Dr Sleeman and Dr Hughes were offered the opportunity to be a part of that, they chose not to participate due to their private clinic commitments,” he said.
The spokesperson confirmed that: “We now have more senior obstetricians working for the hospital than ever before and we are supported by regular, experienced locum doctors, who are well integrated into the maternity unit.
“This has allowed us to increase senior doctor presence in the maternity unit and to maintain and improve other specialist medical services such as antenatal and gynecology clinics essential for care of women in our community.”
The Hospital spokesperson raised concerns over recent comments criticising a visiting locum Obstetrician.
“Dr Claude Calandra is a registered Fellow of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetrics and Gynaecology with 39 years’ experience – there are no safety issues with his practices.
“He is registered with AHPRA so to be questioning his clinical safety is to be questioning both the RANCOG and AHPRA registration practices.
“The information being circulated about Dr Calandra is not only irresponsible and misleading but also causes enormous unwarranted stress to the birthing mothers in this community.”
Both Dr Sleeman and Dr Hughes continue to provide private obstetric care at Mildura Base Hospital.