www.theguardian.com.au Friday, September 30, 2016 $1.60 $ 60

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Helipadsneed 'ispressing'JADE BATE

SICK people in regional areas still aren’t getting the urgent medical care they need because of a lack of helipads near hospitals.

Despite the efforts of Air Ambulance Victoria pilots, they can’t fl y people to hospital if the landing facilitates aren’t there.

Swan Hill local and council candidate Lind-say Rogers is passionate about the issue of building helipads near hospitals and promises to do something about it if elected to council.

He said that many hospital helipads in in-ner Melbourne are obstructed by high-rise construction sites which divert or block fl ight paths.

Furthermore, many regional hospitals don’t have the space or money to build helipads on site.

Often patients fl own to hospital from region-al areas to Melbourne are forced to take off at airstrips and land at Essendon Airport.

This adds extra response time for Ambulance drivers and air ambulance pilots meaning pa-tients aren’t being transported to hospitals through the easiest, most accessible routes.

“We need the government to consider coun-try people in need of these facilities in Mel-bourne so they can accommodate critical pa-tients,” Mr Rogers said.

“Due to a personal tragedy many years ago, I realised fi rst hand how important have access to helipad facilities is for people living in rural and regional areas.

“It’s simply just more convenient to have helipads at hospitals rather than airports.”

As of this week a post from Mr Rogers’ Face-book page about the issue had been liked over 400 times and shared almost 300 times.

In the post he wrote: “In northern Victoria we are a long way from specialist city based care. Thanks to Air Ambulance Victoria who transport those with urgent care needs across Victoria with their Hems Helicopters. There’s no doubt they help save many Victorian lives each year. At about seven tonne, twin engines,

30 man hrs of maintenance for every one hr fl ying and a cost of approximately $7000 per hr it pays to keep your ambulance membership up to date. We need to remind the government of the day to maintain the helicopter landing pads at all the main city hospitals and not re-place them with car parking.”

Prompted by a temporary closure of the Royal Melbourne Hospital helipad in March 2015, due to interference from a construction site in October 2015, the State Government announced that it would protect fl ight paths for helipads at the Royal Children’s, Royal Melbourne, Alfred, Frankston and Warragul hospitals.

“We know that minutes save lives and so we’re looking at how to safeguard the fl ight paths of our rooftop helipads, to ensure pa-tients can get the care they urgently need,” Minister for Health Jill Hennessy said in Oc-tober 2015.

“We want to hear from the community and local residents about any concerns they might have, and I encourage people to have their say.”

Then in February 2016, Victorian Planning Minister Richard Nynne approved height controls for land around major hospitals in Melbourne.

But at this time, only ten hospitals in Victo-ria have restrictions in place to protect fl ight paths from being obstructed, leaving many of the state’s hospital helipads still in danger of being obstructed.

It’s clear from the comments on Mr Rogers’ popular Facebook post that many regional Vic-torians still think not enough has been done to assure people in need of urgent medical at-tention are treated the same as those in met-ropolitan areas.

If Mr Rogers gets elected to council, he plans to write a letter to the State Government to re-empathise the importance of access to helipad facilities.

“If you or had someone you loved in danger you’d do the same thing,” he said.

A Bulldog for lifeNyah West man Charlie Stewart will watch Saturday’s showdown between the Bulldogs and the Swans at the MCG with more than a passing interest. The 77-year-old was a member of the 1961 Footscray side that lost to Hawthorn in the then-VFL grand fi nal by 43 points. For more on his story, turn to page 20

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