AMA VICDOC Spring 2023 - Magazine - Page 7
NEWS, VIEWS + REVIEWS
NEWS, VIEWS
REVIEWS
-
AMA SOCIAL
INFECTIOUS DISEASES EXPERT
FIRST VICTORIAN VACCINATED
Monash Health Medical Director for Infection
Prevention, Prof Rhonda Stuart became the
first person in Victoria to receive the Pfizer
COVID-19 vaccine, when the rollout officially
began on 22 February.
Prof Stuart’s team at Monash Health treated
the first Australian case of COVID-19 in January
2020, a returned traveller from Wuhan in China.
"I'm really proud to be getting this vaccine
and starting the next chapter as our work
against COVID," Prof Stuart said.
"And now our aim is to get all the healthcare
workers vaccinated, and then out to the public
as well."
Frontline workers in healthcare, hotel
quarantine and aged care were among the first
people to receive a shot.
Due to the cold storage requirements of the
Pfizer vaccine, the first phase of the vaccination
rollout will be conducted at nine sites across
Victoria: Western Health, Austin Health, Monash
Health, Barwon Health, Goulburn Valley Health,
Latrobe Health, Bendigo Health, Ballarat Health
and Albury-Wodonga Health.
QUESTIONS RAISED ABOUT
VICTORIA'S HOTEL QUARANTINE
AMA Victoria was very prominent in the
media in February on the topic of hotel
quarantine. President, A/Prof Julian Rait,
told the ABC he was “gobsmacked” to learn
the hotel quarantine program was left out of
Victoria's key taskforce on infection control
for frontline health workers and the policies
were not applied to the embattled system.
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and views with us?
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our members. Email:
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MENTAL HEALTH
PATIENTS WAIT DAYS
IN EMERGENCY WARDS
Suicidal and psychotic patients
spent days waiting in Melbourne
emergency department cubicles
in February as a shortage
of mental health beds was
exacerbated by the forced
lockdown of psychiatric wards
at three hospitals.
There were 129 beds
temporarily closed to new
admissions at The Alfred,
the Northern Hospital and
Broadmeadows Hospital
because a mental health worker
who had worked in all three
health services tested positive
to COVID-19 and was linked to
the Holiday Inn outbreak.
Emergency physician and
AMA Victoria Board Member,
Dr Sarah Whitelaw, told The
Age ambulances had to travel
further with acutely unwell
mental health patients due
to the bed shortages.
Distressed patients
were then spending days
under the bright lights of
unfamiliar hospital emergency
departments instead of being
cared for by staff who knew
their medical history.
“The mental health system
is already shattered. This is just
grinding those pieces into dust
in the ground,” Dr Whitelaw
said. “The moral distress among
staff is the greatest of any issue
I have ever seen right now…
They are so concerned about
the care of these patients.”
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