Goulburn Base Hospital is a public district hospital located in the city of Goulburn, New South Wales in Australia. The hospital is situated on Goldsmith Street, approximately 1 km (0.62 mi) from the Central Business District. The hospital is operated by Southern NSW Local Health District and serves as a regional referral facility providing a range of general, surgical and some specialist services. It is a teaching hospital affiliated with the Australian National University, based in Canberra.
Services An 9 bed emergency department operates 24 hours. Goulburn Base Hospital has a 6 bed Intensive Care Unit for adult patients, specializing in high dependency and coronary care. Critical patients who are suffering from conditions the hospital is not equipped to handle are transferred to Canberra or Sydney. A helipad on the hospital grounds facilitates patient transfers and evacuations. A 20 bed rehabilitation ward was opened in 2013. The Chisholm Ross Centre is a 32 bed inpatient psychiatric unit for patients suffering acute mental health conditions. Other specialist services provided include gastroenterology, ophthalmology a renal unit and a maternity ward. A variety of allied health services are also available on the hospital campus.
History
Origin of the name In worldwide usage, a base hospital is a military hospital located a safe distance from the battlefront to which patients from field hospitals are evacuated for follow up care. After World War I, the term was applied in Australia and New Zealand to large rural hospitals, which, by analogy, performed a similar function of providing specialist or follow up care for patients from smaller hospitals. For instance, in 1923, the NSW Minister for Public Health, Mr. Oakes, while speaking at Goulburn District Hospital, specifically proposed the establishment of rural base hospitals:
"There should be large and properly equipped base hospitals in the important centres and cottage hospitals scattered throughout the various country districts connecting with the larger institutions when necessary by motor service brigades." In the following year, at the launching of a building fund for the hospital, reference was made to the need to provide adequate local funds to attract Government support (50% funding) for establishing a base hospital in Goulburn. The first base hospital established in NSW was Orange Base Hospital in November 1933. However, a number of subsequent attempts to seek funding to bring Goulburn District Hospital up to base hospital standard were unsuccessful. It wasn't until 1940 that Goulburn Hospital was publicly referred to as a Base Hospital. At the 98th Annual General Meeting of the Hospital Committee, a Member of the Board, Mr. W. J. Lewis, was reported, apparently for the first time, as using this name for the hospital by saying:
"...the discussion was the outcome of an earlier reminder to subscribers that the treatment now being given to patients was not confined to Goulburn, but embraced areas within 100 miles radius. Mr. W. J. Lewis: It is the Goulburn 'Base' Hospital." However, six years later, whatever the practical situation, Dr. R. V. Brotherton, the recent Colonel Registrar of Yaralla Military Hospital, then the largest hospital in the Southern Hemisphere, noted that official status was still not forthcoming. Finally, in 1951, twenty eight years after it was first mooted, Goulburn District Hospital was gazetted as the sixth Base Hospital in NSW, meeting requirements including averaging more than 100 patients per day, and the provision of a children's ward and pathological, X-ray and obstetric units. The intent of the Base Hospital system was to treat major cases at important provincial centres, instead of sending patients to Sydney. Doctors at smaller centres would send their patients to base hospitals for specialised treatment. Subsequent changes in health care policies have made the status of the Base Hospital terminology unclear. Although Goulburn remains the largest hospital in the Southern NSW Area Health District, the much larger Canberra Hospital in the neighbouring ACT is where many, more specialised, health treatments are provided. When Orange Base Hospital was redeveloped in 2011, the hospital was renamed Orange Health Service. However, there was significant community protest to return to the Base Hospital title, on the basis that the new name was confusing and that the old name better reflected the hospital's role as a regional hub. This has resulted in the official name being largely replaced in the media and common use by the term Orange Hospital. This may mean that if and when Goulburn Base Hospital is rebuilt or relocated its hard won "Base" title will be lost again.
Foundation of the hospital The history of what was to become the current Goulburn Base Hospital goes back more than 180 years. Residents of County Argyle petitioned Governor Bourke for the provision of public services, including a hospital, in June 1832 on the occasion of his visiting Goulburn Plains. Governor Lachlan Macquarie had founded the Rum Hospital in Sydney in 1810 (completed 1816) despite the British Government's refusal to fund it, and established the policy of founding "Convict Hospitals" with funding from the Colony government in regional areas where demand justified this.
The Convict Hospital A correspondent noted that work on a hospital had commenced by September 1833. Some were unhappy with the result, a complainant in the following year claiming that there was only one room in the facility, with not even a provision for a store or a morgue. He also claimed that the Government funds provided were being wasted, with the contractor seeking a contract variation despite using Government provided labour, possibly convicts. In October 1836, a visitor to the old town of Goulburn (close to the Mulwaree Ponds – Wollondilly River junction), noted:
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