Some hospital patients in Melbourne’s west are going straight home from ICU because there are no beds on the wards. | By Chip Le Grand Melbchief
Some patients in Melbourne hospitals are being sent directly home from intensive care units instead of transferring first to general wards, which doctors say is highly unusual, and a measure of the shortage of beds across the system.
In the early stages of the pandemic, insufficient ICU capacity was seen as a weak link in our COVID preparedness, but now intensive care is one of the areas of the health system that still has reserve capacity. “I can reassure people that there is reliable access to intensive care,” Dr French said.“When we make the decision that someone can go to the ward we would like to send them to the ward within the next six hours or so,” Dr French said.
Daniel Andrew, with nurses union boss Lisa Fitzpatrick, meets student nurses and midwives at Sunshine hospital.Premier Daniel Andrews and Health Minister Mary-Anne Thomas visited Sunshine hospital on Sunday to announce an expansion of a training program that provides government funding for student nurses and midwifes to work part-time in public hospitals.
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