“Wrong decision”: doctors criticize hospital plans for newborns

Plans to manage high-risk births at WA’s new Women and Babies Hospital show the Government is doubling down on a “wrong decision”, says the Doctors’ Lobby.

The hospital is being built next to the Fiona Stanley Hospital in Murdoch, about 20 kilometers from Perth Children’s Hospital (PCH), where some babies will need to be transferred for specialist care.

Doctors and parents have long said the distance is unacceptable and have called on the government to find a way to build a hospital on QEII’s Nedlands campus to facilitate the transfer of women and babies to PCH and Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital.

But the government says this cannot be done without unacceptable disruption to other hospitals on site or unacceptable delays.

Instead, the government has now outlined how it intends to allay the fears of health workers and families by expanding existing services.

Newborn Transfer Update

Pediatric services at Fiona Stanley Hospital will be upgraded, including additional specialist staff and services, and a second Neonatal Emergency Transport Service (NETS) base will be created for babies who need to be transferred from the new hospital.

“We have heard from doctors that the timing of the child reaching the NETS team is key,” said Health Minister Meredith Hammat.

“They are specialized staff, they are like mobile intensive care units, and so they provide a critical ability to stabilize a child and transport them, which is why we are making the decision to establish a base here.”

The government also believes that locating the team at Murdoch will help deliver babies from regional hospitals in a timely manner as it is closer to Jandakot airport where Royal Flying Doctor Service aircraft land.

More beds

About $95 million has been allocated to add 19 additional beds in PCH’s neonatal intensive care unit.

Two adult beds will be added to accommodate the “very small number of cases” of women having to give birth at the children’s hospital.

The consultation report, dated November 2025 but only tabled in Parliament today, found that doctors rejected the idea of ​​a smaller “satellite” facility to deliver births at PCH “due to clinical safety risks, limited workforce sustainability and service fragmentation”.

Ms Hammat said few women would give birth at PCH.

“It only applies in those circumstances, in a small number of circumstances, where the parent may also need to continue treatment,” Ms Hammat said.

Current issues

Australian Medical Association WA president Kyle Hoath said while the government’s announcements were welcome, the profession still wanted a new hospital to be built on the QEII site.

“I understand that this is a full-fledged site where it is difficult to make such tolerances, but this is not enough,” he said. “We have a separation of services that need to be next to each other.”

Opposition health spokeswoman Libby Mettam also wants a maternity hospital on the QEII site and said the government’s plans were “misguided”.

“Newborns requiring high-risk surgery at Perth Children’s Hospital will still have to travel 20 kilometres,” she said.

Dr Hoath said his members believed between 100 and 200 babies a year would need to be transferred to PCH.

The Government’s response to the November 2025 consultation report noted that there was “no consensus on the size of the cohort requiring ‘urgent neonatal transfer’.”

Upgrading PCH will require removing administrative staff from the building and relocating the surgical department.