A former Western Sydney Local Health District Palliative Care Director is calling out Westmead Hospital executives over the demise of its stand-alone Supportive and Palliative Care Unit.
Dr Phillip Lee worked as a Palliative Care Specialist at Westmead and later inherited the role of Director before his retirement in 2017.
During his time at the hospital, he worked alongside a specialist team of doctors and nurses who treated complex palliative patients as experts in pain management, family counselling and most importantly, helping those with terminal illnesses achieve their goals.
“Westmead was at the forefront of the development of palliative care in Australia when they established the ward back in the mid 80’s, it wasn’t even recognised as a specialty until 1999,” Dr Lee told Parra News.
“As a training hospital the focus was the complex patients as we had access to the right specialists.”
Dr Lee recounted the treatment of a complex patient and said the collaboration of specialists it required is “something that could only be achieved in a hospital like Westmead.”
But in 2009 the dedicated palliative care ward was closed, with the beds transferred to the cancer ward.
“Since then the palliative care team has completely lost control and they are no longer dedicated palliative beds,” he said.
“If a patient from the community needs to come in for complex palliative care they have to go to emergency, stay in intensive care or they get transferred to an unsuitable ward; it was a flow on effect to the whole hospital.”
Dr Lee said back when the ward still existed, they would work directly with community nurses to have patients transferred directly to the palliative ward.
Hospitals around the country are expanding their dedicated palliative care wards.
In NSW Liverpool and Concord Hospitals have new dedicated wards, with planning underway for Gosford and Royal North Shore hospitals.
A WSLHD spokesperson said Westmead continues to provide excellent palliative care in its cancer and haematology ward.
“Patients can also be referred to our facility at Mount Druitt Hospital, which has an award-winning, purpose-built and specialised palliative and supportive care service,” the spokesperson said.
“We have partnered with palliative care provider Silver Chain to provide in-home palliative care to patients in western Sydney who have advanced, progressive and life-limiting illnesses.”
Dr Lee said whilst the Mt Druitt ward is great, he believes it can’t provide the same level of quality care for complex cases.
“They’ve forgotten the core reason why the Westmead ward was originally established and that was to treat the complex patients that couldn’t be treated elsewhere,” he said.
A petition for the ward to be reopened can be found here: https://bit.ly/3l4fnWq.
Troy Dodds is Parra News' Managing Editor and Breaking News Reporter. He has more than 20 years experience as a journalist, working with some of Australia’s leading media organisations. In 2023, he was named Editor of the Year at the Mumbrella Publish Awards.