A larger-than-life personality at Hawkesbury Hospital is stepping back from the hue and cry of emergency and directorial roles, and the hospital made a fuss of him on Friday, October 7.
Dr Nadarajah Ramesh, a much-loved doctor at the hospital, gave a speech today at the hospital’s Foundation Day on the occasion of his moving to a visiting medical officer role.
Stepping down from directorial roles in emergency and in medical services, he will be available to the hospital in a more consultative role. His services to the hospital were honoured in the ceremony.'
Dr Ramesh said he joined the hospital at a very exciting time – not long after it was picked to be one of two hospitals in the state trying out a public/private partnership model.
“We are the pioneers in the whole country,” he said. “It was 1996-97 and Port Macquarie tried it at the same time. But they failed within two years as they were a private hospital. It has to be a not-for-profit running it for it to work, I think.
He said it was tough breaking new ground, pioneering an unfamiliar model for operating a hospital.
“I was able to help at a very difficult time when there were workforce and funding crises. This hospital was crying when I joined and is now a happy, smiling hospital.
“Here the community owns the hospital, and the fact we now have a medical school is proof that the public/private model works. We are a contemporary model for the 21st century, and a teaching and training hospital with Westmead and Nepean.”
He started at Hawkesbury in 2002 after a job in the Middle East with the American Hospital during the Gulf War.
“My first five years here were learning how this model worked and helping navigate it through as part of a wonderful team. I was part of the legacy of making the public/private model work as the hospital transformed from just a rural hospital to a district general teaching and training hospital.
Notre Dame University began here about five years ago [enhancing the teaching role of the hospital] and the new building for it opened this year.”
While stepping back in his hands-on capacity, he is still full of enthusiasm about the hospital’s future, saying one of the plans on the boil at the moment was “looking at beefing up the high dependency unit so not everyone has to be transferred to Nepean”.
What are the other things he’s proud of having been a part of over his years at the hospital?
“The biggest achievements were the after-hours GP clinic, and setting up the transfer of myocardial infarct patients to Westmead to get timely stenting. Before, we used to give thrombolytic medication to break the clots up.
“Also getting the mental health community nurse who’s a clinical nurse consultant in the emergency department, and setting up the mobile rehab team which helps get patients home sooner.
“Becoming a training hospital for GPs and for surgical training as well. Some of them have gone on to become specialists at this hospital.
“I think we’ve really the laid the foundation stone for the future of this hospital. It’s a 200-year-old hospital and loyalty is part of the culture. Service to mankind and service to God. It needs to continue and flourish [along these lines].
“We need to let the community stand shoulder to shoulder to make this model work. We need to pressure politicians to give money for the emergency department and operating theatres and high dependency unit, and other services as needed in years to come.”
He said he has “a lot of respect” for the hospital’s Community Board of Advice, comprising community members who give feedback on what the hospital is doing. “It’s a real two-way street; they’re my tools to measure [the impact of] what’s happening.”
Dr Ramesh came to Australia from Sri Lanka in 1993 and his children went to school in the Hawkesbury.
