By CAMERON LUCADOU-WELLS
THE dark days of Dandenong Hospital’s former mental health unit have been literally banished.
At the opening of the final stage of a $69 million redevelopment of the unit, nurse manager Brigid Bosley says the new homely space is more than symbolic.
She talks of the horrors of the past, housing four patients in each room.
How awful it was to room a depressive single mum with psychotic patients or have patients deprived by sleep by their night-wandering companions.
“It was a tough environment to get better in.
“I remember a lady coming to a room and saying do you expect me to sleep here? I was mortified.”
In the nurturing new environs, walled with soothing timbers and bathed with natural light, each patient has their own room.
Each room has swipe card entry, en suite and a private courtyard to ensure security and privacy.
“It gives patients independence and a bit of ownership,” Ms Bosley says.
“That’s the way we do things now. We’re working with the person not doing it to the person.
“Clinicians walk over here and say this is nice. It helps shape attitudes.
“It says we value our clients, we value our staff.
“With 120 beds, the unit is the state’s largest. Yet its short corridors and shared activity rooms wrapped around courtyards give intimacy, says Irwin Alsop health planner Bill Henning, who helped with its design.
Mental Health Minister Mary Wooldridge, who opened the unit, said the extra 43 beds were a boost to the state’s mental health resources not just the region.
“With these new beds at Dandenong, we will see a statewide increase in SECU capacity of more than 30 per cent, ensuring a significant increase in the capacity to care for people who are severely unwell,” Ms Wooldridge said.
The unit includes 50 adult acute beds, 20 aged acute beds, 50 secure extended-care beds and a research and training suite.
South-East Metropolitan Region MP Gordon Rich-Phillips said people had “more opportunity than ever to access the type of care they needed, when they needed it, in their local community”.
