Ron Vale Walker

WALWA WORLD Free - Donations Accepted A free monthly Walwa-Jingellic community newsletter covering the Upper Murray from Lankeys Creek to Tintaldra to Burrowye and from Ournie to Talmalmo February 2018 RON VALE WALKER Many people in our had become “Dora’s Angels” community will remember the and found themselves on the day Mr Ron Walker came to front page of the Herald Sun. town. The Walwa Bush Nursing Hospital, was a 10 I was Director of Nursing at bed inpatient facility back in the time, and was woken at 4 those days, and had struggled am by a call from John for years to make ends meet. Blackman of 3AW radio As a private hospital, it station, asking what I thought received no government funding at all, and was dependent on of the front page of the admitting patients with private health insurance for income. Sadly, newspaper. This call was as farming got tougher, many families dropped their private health closely followed by a call from the nurse on night duty saying insurance and this impacted dramatically on the hospital. “you’d better get in here, something’s going on”. On arrival to the BNH, I found a satellite dish set up in the grounds, press cars and The Board of Management at the time had worked tirelessly in an trucks arriving continually and choppers landing on the football attempt to save the hospital. Ably lead by David field. Reporters from every TV news and current Hanna, Board members travelled the country (in affairs Australia wide were attempting to gain their own time, and often in their own vehicles), access to the hospital in any way they could. The meeting and lobbying politicians, doing press morning was a whirlwind of interviews, interviews, visiting other health services, photographs and trying to protect Dora from the enlisting assistance wherever possible, often in press that desperately wanted access to her. All the form of pro-bono work from friends and this was also going on whilst we tried to look after relatives, all in a desperate attempt to keep the the other 8 patients admitted at the time. hospital open. We were even the subject of an ABC episode of It was on this day, that Ron Walker came to town. Some people “Australian Story” focussing on the may not be familiar with this giant of a man. He was, amongst likelihood the GPs would leave town if many things, a property developer, the business partner of Mr the hospital closed. Despite all of this Lloyd Williams in the company Hudson Conway which developed incredible work and commitment, the Crown Casino. Mr Walker was also known widely for bringing the assistance we needed was not formula 1 Grand Prix to Melbourne, then becoming the Chairman forthcoming. of the Australian Grand Prix Corporation. He was the Having exhausted every avenue, it was Chairman of Fairfax media, and with extremely heavy hearts that the Board called a meeting to the Liberal Party Treasurer for announce the closure of the hospital. The flow on effect of this 15 years. As well as all of this, was likely to be catastrophic. The doctors felt they would be he was had a strong unable to continue without the assistance of the nurses and the philanthropic nature, so when hospital facility, the closure of a major employer was likely to Mrs Barbara Walker received impact negatively on the local economy, and the subsequent delivery of her copy of the migration of people away from a town that no longer had medical Herald Sun that morning and services, was likely to see the end of Walwa itself. instructed her husband to “get up there and make sure those woman are not disadvantaged” he At the time this was happening, we had a flew to Walwa and made the incredibly generous donation of number of patients still admitted to the hospital. $150,000 to the hospital. The Board knew that whilst this was a One in particular, Mrs Dora Peacock, had made sizable sum, the hospital model was going to continue to cost it very clear that she wanted to live her considerably more than that to stay open and would always remaining days in the Walwa Hospital. She was struggle. In their travels, whilst attempting to save the hospital, the very unwell, and was unlikely to have a have a Board had come across a number of other models of health. great deal of time left. Her family was very Despite the lack of inpatient beds in these other facilities, they worried that the hospital would close before she were making a great difference to the overall health of their had passed away. In order to allay these fears, the nurses of the communities via a range of diverse services. With this in mind, the hospital, in particular Irene Palmer, Jodi Sholz and Sandi Grieve Board made the decision to close the hospital and use Mr Walker’s offered to continue to come to work, without pay, to nurse Dora, donation to start our redevelopment as a Bush Nursing Centre. even after the hospital had closed its doors. As well as the remarkable donation, Mr Walker also gave us Unbeknown to the nurses, there was a journalist in Walwa doing a access to a number of politicians we were previously unable to talk very small story on the closure of our little country hospital. He to. So, this gave us the opportunity to start to have some more heard about the nurses’ decision to work for free to provide the meaningful discussions around what services our community dying wish of treasured patient. Before they knew it, the nurses needed and to start to plan for our future. Cont’d Page 3 Walwa World February 2018 www.walwabushnursing.com Editor: Irene Palmer WALWA SERVICES MEMORIAL HALL Publisher: Kerrie Thompson A public meeting of members of the district is being PO Box 46 called by the Walwa Services Hall Committee to be Walwa VIC 3709 held on Ph: 02 6037 1220 Tuesday 13 March 2018 Fax: 02 6037 1207 at the Memorial Hall Email: [email protected] at 7:30pm and cc to [email protected] to elect a member of the committee. J Blackburn Copies in colour are available on the website at Hon Sec www.walwabushnursing.com Ian Gordon Beith 11th February 1930 ~ 29th January 2018 DEADLINE for articles for next edition 12 NOON FIDAY 16 MARCH 2018 NO articles will be accepted after this deadline Send articles in either Word or Publisher. DO NOT SEND PDF as articles sometimes need adjustment to fit on the page. Also DO NOT SEND PHOTOS BY ePDF send as attachment or in body of email. For group reports please limit articles to 220 words and 2 photos. Photos must have publication approval from What's on at the the subject. Please label your photos Bush Nursing Centre this month Thank you for all our loyal advertisers and to Walwa Post Office and Jingellic Store, Sue Wilkie who provides free distribution services which enables us to keep the Walwa World a free paper. ALWA MEDICAL CLINIC & PHARMACY ADVERTISE WITH WALWA WORLD Rates are as follows: Doctors during March are; Business card size @ $10 per edition or $110p/a Dr John Sanderson ¼ page @ $15 per edition or $165p/a Dr Dave Hunt ½ page @$25 per edition or $275p/a Appointments can be made with the following practitioners: Massage Therapist - Narelle Rouch Ph: 6037 4122 Maternal Health Nurse - Leanne Webb Ph: 0427 334 448 Walwa World is for the delivering of information and articles for the benefit of the community. This information is not a 16 - 18 Main Street substitute for professional advice and is not intended to be used as such. The editor does not accept any liability for any Phone: 02 6037 1222 loss or damage incurred by use of, or reliance on such Fax: 02 6037 1207 information and makes every effort to ensure the quality of the E-mail: information. However Walwa World cannot guarantee and [email protected] assumes no legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, currency or completeness of information. www.walwabushnursing.com Walwa World February 2018 2 www.walwabushnursing.com Cont’d from page 1 through the planning and building stages of the new facility, as well as working on the BNC executive, basically doing 3 jobs at Once again we found ourselves on an once! endless round of meetings with politicians and government departments, touring Finally, in early 2006, the building was other health services, talking to other complete. Mr and Mrs Ron Walker flew providers and our community. We were back to Walwa to officially cut the ribbon also very lucky that that all of this and declare the new service open. This coincided with the Upper Murray Health was another remarkable day, attended by and Community Services, Evidence Based past and present community members, Needs Assessment. This extremely politicians, dignitaries and press. Mr valuable document undertaken by the Walker left with the promise to look Corryong Community Liaison Group (of favourably at other health projects we Upper Murray Health and Community may be interested in providing for our Services), was the result of an extensive look at the health needs community. In particular, we discussed of our community, and culminated in a number of evidence based the potential for a partnership between recommendations that we were able to incorporate into our the Barbara Walker Pain Management service and a country service planning. branch in Walwa. To this end, we have kept in touch with the It was obvious however, that the Walkers from time to time and building that had been the home of the they have been ever generous hospital was not at all appropriate for with their time.

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