New beds at major children's hospital to go unused due to funding issue

Royal Children's Hospital beds to go unused with no funding to staff them In short: Staffing issues are threatening to undermine a $50 million dollar expansion of Victoria's largest children's hospital. Twenty new emergency beds at the Royal Children's Hospital will not be able to take patients because no funding was provided to staff them. It's understood one solution being explored is transferring staff from other areas of the hospital. Victoria's major children's hospital will not be able to use 20 new beds provided under a multi-million-dollar expansion because there is currently no funding for extra staff to operate them. The new emergency department beds were promised under a $50 million upgrade of the Royal Children's Hospital (RCH) announced by the state government in 2018. The expansion is nearing completion, but hospital sources have told the ABC the new beds will not be operational because no additional funding was provided for extra staff needed to operate them. It's understood one solution being explored is transferring staff from other areas of the hospital. Staff have been devastated by this development, with some displaying signs around the emergency department as part of protected industrial action as pay negotiations continue. One of the signs said the "extension looks lovely but no money for extra staff required". Another poster apologised to patients for "the long wait", explaining that the emergency department has below-average staffing and beds for a facility that treats about 90,000 patients per year. It cited Australasian College for Emergency Medicine suggesting an average equivalent department has 50 per cent more doctors, 40 per cent more nurses, 60 per cent more beds to treat patients and 110 per cent more beds for those who need to stay longer. An email shared among senior medical staff detailed ongoing frustration and disappointment among colleagues with the "imminent completion of our ED expansion but with no prospect of being able to staff and open those areas due to a lack of funding". The email said that staff had spent years dealing with under-resourcing and rapidly growing demand that exceeded the number of patients the facility was built for. "We can be honest with each other and accept that despite our best efforts, the standard of care we would like to deliver and believe our patients deserve was being compromised," the email said. "By 2018 we were seeing over 80,000 children a year and an acknowledgement made by the Victorian government that we needed to expand by an additional 20 beds — effectively a 50% increase." The email said RCH executives had been supportive of staff concerns and acknowledged that only more staff could bring the beds online. The Australian Medical Association of Victoria said it was aware of the situation and had spoken to concerned staff. "We're extremely concerned that the RCH is already underfunded and under-supported with treatment spaces,"president Simon Judkins said. "Clearly this investment in 20 treatment spaces without staff is going to continue to ensure that the growing demands in the ED are not going to be met, and stress on staff is going to continue. "This follows the pattern of this government putting money into building things but not supporting the staff to do the job, and we've seen this time and time again." The hospital, the state health department and Health Minister Ingrid Stitt were contacted for comment but did not respond to specific questions about the funding issue. A Victorian government spokesperson said Labor was "working closely with the hospital to transition services into the expanded emergency department once works are complete". An RCH spokesperson said the hospital was working with the health department to "provide improved access to emergency care for children and young people". [Image text:] The Royal Children'sHossitl