Page 2722 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 6 June 2012
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occupied. But there is additional capacity for women who have not been able to birth because the three birthing suites have been utilised and they have had to birth in the delivery suites. So the extra capacity will allow us to manage some of that.
In terms of priority in this budget, and with the resources available, it was money for the neonatal intensive care unit, extra staff in that, because it was a new model of care. The midwives at Calvary have lobbied me quite heavily on having a program of continuity of care for midwifery for women on the north side of Canberra, and this budget delivers that.
MR SPEAKER: Ms Bresnan, a supplementary.
MS BRESNAN: Minister, of all the models of birthing provided by ACT Health, does the birth centre have the highest level of unmet demand?
MS GALLAGHER: Yes, it would, in terms of a waiting list. There is a waiting list for the community midwives program. Women who come through the public system on the CatCH or through the general antenatal program are all seen through those programs. So, yes, there is a waiting list. Again, it is balancing the available resources to manage demand. I have to say that at Canberra Hospital we have the community midwives program and we have the CatCH program. At Calvary we had neither of those programs. In this budget, when we looked at the money available, the priority was to provide a continuity model on the north side of Canberra.
MS HUNTER: Supplementary.
MR SPEAKER: Yes, Ms Hunter.
MS HUNTER: Minister, is it true that women have to book the birth centre before they are five weeks pregnant if they are to secure a place?
MS GALLAGHER: I have not heard that it is five weeks, but I was aware that you were having to try to get a spot certainly within your first trimester of pregnancy.
I would love to see this model of care grow, and when resources are available we will do that. We have put extra midwives into the Canberra Hospital. We have started up the CatCH program, we have now expanded the birth centre, and we have now started continuity of care with midwives on the north side of Canberra. So I think you can see our commitment to midwifery-led models of care for women who are wanting that service. But there is always more to be done; you could always put additional resources into those models of care.
The challenge in the ACT is also managing the different types of care that are required—the foetal medical unit, the high-risk pregnancy group, the antenatal program, those women who want to use the delivery suite, the community midwife program, the continuity of care program. And then of course there is the private system as well.
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