DARWIN’S ageing public hospital will need to be replaced within the next 20 years – potentially costing $2 billion – according to the NT branch of Australia’s peak medical body.
Australian Medical Association NT president Dr Rob Parker said planning for a replacement facility to the Royal Darwin Hospital needed to start as soon as possible.
“RDH is very crowded and very old. There’s a significant concern about the hospital itself and its capacity to meet health needs,” he said.
Australian Medical Association NT president Dr Rob Parker says planning for a replacement facility to the Royal Darwin Hospital needs to start soon. PICTURE: Ivan Rachman
“The use-by date of the hospital is approaching. I think the current building will need to be demolished in 20 years.”
Territory Labor floated the idea of replacing the hospital in its health position paper released earlier this year, but is yet to cost the plan.
Most of the recent debate about primary health services has focused on the under-construction $150 million Palmerston Hospital.
The Palmerston building will have an emergency department and some specialist facilities, including for cardiology, diabetes and infectious diseases. But it’s still largely unclear the extent to which the new hospital will complement RDH or duplicate services also offered in the northern suburbs.
Cabinet had long been divided on whether to push ahead with the Palmerston Hospital plan or seek significantly more money to fully replace Royal Darwin as the Top End’s main health facility now.
The argument came to a head during a fiery cabinet meeting in 2013. Dave Tollner, then Health Minister was in favour of a single grand hospital at Palmerston. During an argument he hurled a folder of cabinet documents at then-Chief Minsiter Terry Mills.
The argument continued after Mr Mills was replaced. But eventually the decision was made to push ahead with the $150 million plan, and to spend other money upgrading Royal Darwin.
It’s expected completely replacing Royal Darwin Hospital would cost about $2 billion. Doing so would likely require a large contribution from the Federal Government.
Dr Parker said he had concerns about the hospital’s capacity to meet national health benchmarks such as emergency department and surgical waiting times.
Figures from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare show that in 2014/15, only 67 per cent of category two – or surgeries required within 90 days – were completed on time, failing to meet the national benchmark of 77 per cent and down from the year previous year of 75 per cent.
The other category time frames were also down with 87 per cent of surgeries completed within 30 days, down from 90 per cent the previous year, and 82 per cent of surgeries completed within one year, down from 87 per cent last year.
Waiting times at NT emergency departments were the longest in the country in 2014/15. The median wait was 31 minutes, with just 60 per cent of patients seen on time.
Dr Parker said the country was heading into major health problems in the coming decades, without proper planning in place to deal with the burden of an ageing population.