ANY parent who has ever sat through the days or nights by the side of a sick child in the Bowral Hospital’s old children’s ward will applaud the opening of the new ward this week.
Lack of privacy, bathroom doors that opened the wrong way, making it almost impossible to carry a child or push a wheelchair through, and the generally dingy atmosphere of the ageing ward made a childhood illness or accident an even more dismal experience for many young patients and their parents.
Lack of an isolation ward for infectious patients, and access which forced parents and children to walk through an adult ward added to the distress of many families.
The State Government - so often criticised in these pages for their failure to respond to the health needs of Southern Highlands residents - deserves credit for responding to the calls of the community for a better facility to local children.
Credit should also go to the BDCU Children’s Foundation, who have worked over many years to highlight the short-comings in the old ward and to rally the community’s support for a fundraising effort to buy equipment and furniture for the new ward.
Their work will help to make children’s stay in the ward more pleasant and assist the hard-working staff in their duties.
Former Member for the Southern Highlands Peta Seaton lobbied tirelessly for improvements to health services in general and the children’s ward in particular, and her successor, Pru Goward, has carried on this work.
The children’s ward is an example of what can be achieved when the State Government listens to the people and works with them to achieve their goals.
Well done to all concerned.