Louise Oriti, Executive Director

International Women’s Day

Today is International Women’s Day, a great opportunity to acknowledge the women who do so much amazing work at RBWH.

The theme for this year is Count Her In – highlighting how important economic empowerment is to women’s rights and gender equality. We are immensely proud of the thousands of women employed by RBWH across a broad spectrum of fields. Take some time today to show your appreciation to your colleagues.

Executive Leadership Team

The Executive Committee met this week to discuss a number of topics important to the operation of the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital. Demand for our services and our capacity will be a major topic in our Five-Year Outlook planning day on March 14.

The RBWH’s Gender Service Coordinator Rebecca Cooley presented the new Gender Diversity Awareness Video produced by her team. The video and all its content was co-designed by the group of consumers, as the subject-matter experts. I highly recommend everyone across the organisation take a few minutes to watch this informative video.

We also heard from Alison Mudge who spoke extensively about the issue of delirium and presented a Vision Statement on behalf of the Delirium and Dementia SME Group. One in three adults who are treated at RBWH will have some level of cognitive impairment, and that it can affect people of all ages. Delirium is the most common post-operative complication and it can cause stress for patients and staff and on the hospital systems. The Executive Committee agreed this will be an area of focus for 2024/25.

Dolphins visit

It was nice to see so many smiling faces last week when the Dolphins NRL team came to visit patients and staff at the Royal. Two players, Isaiya Katoa and Trai Fuller – and mascot Phinny, graciously gave their time to meet patients in the Surgical Day Care Unit, handing out stickers, footballs and posters. They then spent time outside the RBWH Foundation meeting and greeting patients and staff. With a line extending around the corner they took the time to have a friendly chat with everyone, as well as signing autographs and posing for photos. Thank you to the Foundation for organising the visit.

All-gender bathrooms

I’m very pleased to inform you that the RBWH now has four all-gender public bathrooms available for all patients, staff and visitors. Their locations are:

• Department of Emergency Medicine waiting room
• Ground floor atrium
• Level 6 of the James Mayne Building
• Level 4 of the Joyce Tweddell Building

RBWH is a large, diverse and welcoming community, so any steps we can take to support members of trans and gender-diverse community are highly positive. The signage on the bathrooms (shown here) is designed to reduce anxiety and confusion for those in the gender-diverse community.

Morning tea for Andy Carter

Last Friday was the final day at RBWH for our Executive Director of Nursing and Midwifery Andy Carter. We farewelled Andy with a morning tea, where he was praised for his strategic mind, calmness under pressure and endless compassion for patients.

It’s sad to see Andy go and we wish him all the best in the future. Tracey Daelman is adapting swiftly to the Acting DONM role, and we thank her for her diligence.

Positive feedback

We recently received this positive feedback about Maternity Ward 6B.

“I have to say that our superstar midwife was incredible. She was so reassuring and knowledgeable. She led in an amazing caring way – this is the attitude to strive towards. Very impressive, please pass on our thanks to her and the team. Good job all round team.”

Thank you for your ongoing commitment to our patients and the community that we serve.

Kind regards,

Louise.