$90m for hospital a priority

CAIRNS Hospital has been struggling to cope with an extended period of unprecedented demand, with record numbers of patients flowing through the emergency department.

But Advance Cairns believes it has the solution, and will be calling upon the Palaszczuk Government to provide $90 million towards it.

The Far North’s peak economic advocacy group says the Cairns University Hospital project should be a State budget priority, and with it will come a permanent fix to the overflowing ED.

Palaszczuk Government is being called upon to invest $90 million to ease pressure on Cairns Hospital’s emergency department, and help the facility expand into research.

Advance Cairns will today launch the first of its Far Northern infrastructure priorities for the upcoming State budget, supporting the push for a Cairns University Hospital.

This includes adding a new five-storey Research Education and Innovation Centre on land adjoining the hospital campus.

The Coalition and Labor have committed $60 million towards the project, but Advance Cairns wants the State Government to provide an extra $90 million to help progress the centre, and add more permanent bed space to the hospital itself.

The hospital has been struggling since the start of the year with an extended period of high activity, with more than 200 patients a day seeking treatment in the emergency department.

While the Cairns and Hinterland Hospital and Health Service has been trying to recruit extra staff to alleviate the pressure on its ED, Advance Cairns chief executive Nick Trompf said a longer-term fix was needed.

“The problem is actually beyond the emergency department,” he said.

“The problem is there’s not enough beds in the ward, once patients come out of the ED.

“And it’s critical, therefore, that one of the ways to free up more bedspace is to be able to get the James Cook University medicine students out of Block A, where they currently are, which would free up more space for patients in the hospital.”