Louise O’Riordan
A/Executive Director
Redcliffe Hospital

Dr Catherine Yelland

This week, we celebrated the career and contribution to Redcliffe Hospital of one of our most respected medical officers, Dr Catherine Yelland PSM.

Dr Yelland is retiring after a long and distinguished career at Redcliffe Hospital and Metro North Health.

Over the course of that career, Dr Yelland has been awarded the Public Service Medal (PSM) for her leadership in older person’s medicine and has served as president of both the Australian and New Zealand Society of Geriatric Medicine and Royal Australasian College of Physicians.

At Redcliffe, Dr Yelland’s leadership as medical director for the Medicine Service Line has improved the way we care for our older patients. As part of our hospital’s Senior Leadership Team (SLT), her voice has been strong and influential, advocating patient safety and for the interests of doctors and clinicians.

More than fifty staff and colleagues joined us for a farewell afternoon tea for Dr Yelland this week, sharing cake, stories, and fond memories. 

We wish Dr Yelland well for her next adventures and thank her for everything that she has done for our older patients, her leadership of the Medicine Service Line, and her impact in mentoring women in medicine.

Redcliffe Hospital Expansion

Earlier today we welcomed the Queensland Premier Steven Miles together with the Health Minister Shannon Fentiman, and Attorney-General and Member for Redcliffe Yvette D’Ath to Redcliffe Hosptial for a close look at the early works now underway on the Redcliffe Hosptial Expansion.

Alongside the Premier and Health Minister, Nursing Director Matt Wharton also fronted the press conference to tell everyone about how our new clinical services building will benefit patients, staff, and the local community.

Well done Matt, and thanks to everyone involved in supporting this morning’s event. 

To help keep hospital staff up to date with what’s happening with the Expansion works and other projects scheduled this year, we’ve reinstated our regular Clinical Interface Forum meetings. 

If you’d like to be invited to these fortnightly meetings, click here.

Showgrounds car parking EOI

As the Expansion works progress, there will be more car parking changes. Staff working day-shift with paid parking passes are encouraged to submit an EOI to park in the Redcliffe Showgrounds to help ensure that our patients, visitors, and night shift staff can park on the hospital campus.

When it reopens later this month, the Redcliffe Showgrounds car park will operate from 5am to 6pm, Monday to Friday. A parking inspector will be onsite to ensure only staff with parking passes can enter the car park. By mid-2024, boom gates and swipe card access will be installed, as well as works to widen parking bays to match the size of parking bays on the hospital campus.

To find out more about the car parking EOI, click here.

New Nursing Director in CCWC

I’m pleased to announce Joanna Green’s appointment as an additional Nursing Director in the Critical Care, Women’s and Children’s Service Line (CCWC). 

With the appointment of Joanna, we’ll have two nursing directors in CCWC; Joanna will be a nursing director for women and children, and Fiona Packwood will continue as the nursing director for critical care.  
 
Joanna will commence in the role in mid-February. Please join me in congratulating Joanna on her appointment.

People & Culture Forum

Our People & Culture Forums are back this year, with the first session set for Wednesday 21 February, from 1pm on Teams. This session will feature Sarah Webster from the Ethical Standards Unit, discussing how we access patient information databases, like The Viewer, ieMR and EDIS, and what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate access.

As we prepare for ieMR, this session will help everyone understand our obligations around patient information databases. 

Click here to receive an Outlook invitation.

Lastly this week, a reminder about our Health Equity in-service sessions currently being offered to Redcliffe Hosptial staff. The next sessions will be available in the Education Centre on Tuesday, 20 February, starting at 8:30am and 2pm. 

I encourage everyone to find out more about those sessions here.

Louise.