Ramsay Health Care has opened the Northern Private Hospital in New Epping, delivering quality patient care to one of the fast-growing suburbs in Victoria.
Located in Riverlee’s New Epping estate, stage one opened with 70 patient beds, four operating theatres, a cardiac catheterisation lab, a sleep study unit, a day chemotherapy unit, on-site pharmacy, pathology, and medical imaging.
The new hospital opened to patients yesterday.
Patients will be able to access private health care closer to home, with a wide range of specialities including general medicine; cancer care; cardiac care; ear, nose and throat; orthopaedics; IVF and fertility; vascular care; urology; nephrology; gastroenterology; general surgery; thoracic surgery; respiratory and sleep services; and plastic and reconstructive surgery.
Lumus Imaging, one of the largest imaging providers with 150 sites across Australia, will be on site providing high-quality imaging services to the hospital and community.
The hospital has unique features, being the first Ramsay hospital in Australia to make use of the Vocera communication platform and Zebra smartphones.
The new system will allow for a ‘quiet hospital’ so that all patient call bells and any emergency code are sent to the devices and are not audible across the hospital, ensuring patients can rest and recuperate in a silent environment.
Clinical services director Dan Mabon said the smartphones would change how nursing was operated.
“We can integrate a lot of our systems so that we can instantly see how that patient is recovering, so if they’re unwell we will know quicker, and we’ll be able to communicate with our patients quicker, they will be able to communicate with us directly,” he said.
“We wouldn’t have to have these buzzers going off, so they’ll be able to sleep.”
The hospital is co-located to the Northern Hospital with a linking bridge, which will enable both hospitals to work in conjunction, including supporting the Northern’s busy emergency department.
Chief executive Shaune Gillespie said Ramsay Health had a great partnership with the Northern Hospital.
“We’ll be working with them, so any patient that identifies they have private health insurance, we’ll work with them and see whether the patient wants to use their health insurance and come across and be admitted to the private hospital,” he said.
“So that way we can try and help with the busyness of the Northern, their [Emergency Department] ED is the busiest ED in the country, they have a lot of presentations, so it’s just giving the community access to private health if they wish to use it, private health cover.”
In the long term, the hospital will expand its services with stage two and stage three in the next developmental years.
Stage two will feature an additional 36 overnight beds and two operating theatres, while stage three will include a 12-space Emergency Department with two resuscitation bays, two theatres, one cath lab, eight-bed Intensive Care Unit, ICU, three CCU and 100 medical and surgical beds.
Mr Gillespie said the overall vision of the hospital would be a ‘warm, welcoming’ space.
“I want it to be a warm, welcoming, friendly environment where people enjoy coming and get really good service, good care and would recommend us and to come back if they need our services again.” he said.
Northern Private Hospital is at 12 Osburn Place, on the corner of Osburn Place and Norwell Street in the Riverlee New Epping Estate.
For more information, visit www.northernprivate.com.au.
