The Children's Hospital at Westmead | |||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Sydney Children's Hospital Network | |||||||||||
Geography | |||||||||||
Location | Cnr Hawkesbury Rd & Hainsworth St, Westmead, New South Wales, Australia | ||||||||||
Coordinates | 33°48′06″S150°59′31″E / 33.8017°S 150.992°E | ||||||||||
Organisation | |||||||||||
Care system | Medicare (Australia) | ||||||||||
Funding | Public hospital | ||||||||||
Type | Specialist; Teaching | ||||||||||
Affiliated university | University of Sydney | ||||||||||
Network | NSW Health | ||||||||||
Services | |||||||||||
Emergency department | Yes: Pediatric Major Trauma Centre | ||||||||||
Beds | 340 | ||||||||||
Helipads | |||||||||||
Helipad | (ICAO: YXWM) | ||||||||||
| |||||||||||
History | |||||||||||
Opened | 1880 | ||||||||||
Links | |||||||||||
Website | Official website | ||||||||||
Lists | Hospitals in Australia |
The Children's Hospital at Westmead (CHW; formerly Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children) is a children's hospital in Western Sydney. The hospital was founded in 1880 as "The Sydney Hospital for Sick Children". Its name was changed to the "Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children" on 4 January 1904 when King Edward VII granted use of the appellation 'Royal' and his consort, Queen Alexandra, consented to the use of her name.
The Children's Hospital at Westmead is one of three children's hospitals in New South Wales. It is currently located on Hawkesbury Road in Westmead and is affiliated with the University of Sydney.
On 1 July 2010, the Children's Hospital at Westmead became part of the newly formed The Sydney Children's Hospitals Network (Randwick and Westmead), incorporating the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children. [1]
The hospital was opened in 1880 as the Sydney Hospital for Sick Children. In 1878, Jessie Campbell-Browne, wife of the Member for Singleton, had gathered a group of women to discuss the merits of establishing a children's hospital in Sydney; the outcome of Campbell-Browne's overtures was the new hospital. It soon outgrew the small building in which it was housed at Glebe Point. In 1906, it moved to a much grander building, designed by Harry Kent in Camperdown, where it stayed for 89 years, where it was known as the Camperdown Children's Hospital. [2]
In 1995, the hospital was relocated to its current location in Westmead to better serve the growing populations of Western Sydney. This relocation involved amalgamation with most of the paediatric services of nearby Westmead Hospital (apart from neonates) to form a new hospital with a new name, initially "The New Children's Hospital" and, more recently, "The Children's Hospital at Westmead".
The official name of the Children's Hospital at Westmead, the "Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children", is retained.
The Children's Hospital at Westmead is one of the busiest Children's Hospitals in New South Wales seeing over 80,000 patients annually. In addition to the emergency department, outpatient clinics and inpatient departments receive patients by general practitioner and specialist referral. [3]
The Adolescent Medicine at The Children's Hospital at Westmead seeks to improve the health and wellbeing of young people aged 12–24. The key focus areas include developing information and resources; capacity building to increase workers' skills and confidence in adolescent health; supporting applied research; advocacy and policy development to increase leadership and action for adolescent health. [4]
In February 2023, a team of doctors at Westmead led by Joseph Elkadi, Catherine Chudleigh, and Ann M. Maguire published an article in the paediatric journal Children examining the developmental pathway and clinical outcomes of 79 transgender children who presented at the hospital's gender service, the conclusions of which are contested. [5] The authors concluded that gender-affirming healthcare is, in effect, "iatrogenic" and a "non-standard risky approach".
The conclusions reached by the Westmead team's study were subsequently analysed and disputed by the Australian New Zealand Professional Association for Transgender Health (AusPATH). [6] In a response letter dated 1 March 2023, the Westmead study's authors were criticised for "significant bias" in their use of terminology and selection of supporting literature. AusPATH found that the Westmead article cited a preponderance of marginal literature that tended to be critical of the gender-affirming approach, without any balancing consideration of the "well-described, established" body of work demonstrating benefits of the more medically-accepted treatments. AusPATH also identified a range of methodological flaws and misrepresentations of data in the Westmead study.
AusPATH holds that the Westmead team's use of "discredited literature", in particular its use of the scientifically-unverified "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria" (ROGD) classification for study participants, compromises the validity of the research. The ROGD designation is not widely accepted within the field. AusPATH found the 'ROGD' term use in the research was supported by citing medical lobby groups such as the National Association of Practicing Psychiatrists (NAPP). This NAPP makes no claims of expertise or interest in clinical-policy guidance. [7] [lower-alpha 1] The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP), the peak body for psychiatry in Australia, does not refer to ROGD in any policy documents, while the Australian Psychological Society (APS) considers current scientific evidence refutes the concept. While NAPP has made a number of submissions to parliamentary enquiries and other governmental bodies on non-medical policy formation, [lower-alpha 2] it is generally viewed as a lobby group. The Westmead study's authors were also criticised for using "de-humanising" anti-trans language and for "pathologising" gender diversity in a discriminatory way. [6] [11] [12]
In July 2023, the Health Minister for New South Wales, Ryan Park, announced the government would commission a state-wide review of gender-affirming care, to be undertaken by the health policy group the Sax Institute. The review was initiated following a "string of staff resignations", which ABC News, Australia said were linked to the disputed research; the ABC characterised the research as "endorsed by the hospital hierarchy". [13]
Some notable individuals connected to the history of the Children's Hospital are:
Some notable individuals connected to the history of the Children's Hospital are:
Westmead is a suburb in Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Westmead is located 26 kilometres west of the Sydney central business district in the local government area of Cumberland Council and is part of the Greater Western Sydney region.
Monash Medical Centre (MMC) is a teaching hospital in Melbourne, Australia. It provides specialist tertiary-level healthcare to the Melbourne's south-east.
John Samuel Yu is a Chinese-born Australian paediatrics doctor who served as CEO of the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children from 1979 until 1997. He was the Australian of the Year for 1996.
The Royal Children's Hospital (RCH), colloquially referred to as the Royal Children’s, is a major children's hospital in Parkville, a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Regarded as one of the great children’s hospitals globally, the hospital and its facilities are internationally recognised as a “leading centre for paediatrics”. The hospital serves the entire states of Victoria, and Tasmania, as well as southern New South Wales and parts of South Australia.
The Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) is a not-for-profit professional organisation responsible for training and educating physicians and paediatricians across Australia and New Zealand.
Sydney Children's Hospital, Randwick, is an Australian children's hospital located in the eastern suburbs of Sydney, New South Wales.
Susan Jane Bradley is a Canadian psychiatrist. She has written many journal articles and books, including Gender Identity Disorder and Psychosexual Problems in Children and Adolescents and Affect Regulation and the Development of Psychopathology. Bradley was chair of the DSM-IV Subcommittee on Gender Disorders.
Sir Norman McAlister Gregg, was an Australian ophthalmologist, who discovered that rubella suffered by a pregnant woman could cause birth defects in her child.
Sir Lorimer Fenton Dods was a pioneer of specialised health care for children who founded, with assistance from Dr John Fulton and Douglas Burrows, the Children's Medical Research Foundation. He is considered one of Australia's most influential paediatricians.
The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) is the principal organisation representing the medical specialty of psychiatry in Australia and New Zealand and has responsibility for training, examining and awarding the qualification of Fellowship of the College (FRANZCP) to medical practitioners. The college was established on 9 October 1946, and received Royal patronage in 1977.
Several hospitals and former hospitals are known formally or informally as Royal Hospital or simply The Royal, indicating some form of royal patronage, such as sponsorship, usage, or creation by royal charter.
Colonel Sir Edward Ford, was an Australian soldier, academic and physician. He played an important role in the anti-malaria campaign in the South West Pacific Area during the Second World War, and in preventative medicine in Australia after the war, but is best known for his Bibliography of Australian Medicine.
Puberty blockers are medicines used to postpone puberty in children. The most commonly used puberty blockers are gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) agonists, which suppress the production of sex hormones, including testosterone and estrogen. In addition to their use in treating precocious puberty, which involves puberty occurring at an unusually early age in children, puberty blockers are also used for transgender children to delay the development of unwanted sex characteristics, so as to allow transgender youth more time to explore their gender identity.
Douglas Squire Irving Burrows CBE (Civil) MBE (Military) was an Australian stock broker, businessman and philanthropist who from 1970 until his death was President of the Board Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children. With Lorimer Dods and John Fulton he co-founded the Children's Medical Research Foundation of which from 1970 he became the Chairman of the Management Committee.
Phyllis Margery Anderson was an Australian pathologist.
Louise Baur is an Australian paediatrician with a research interest in childhood obesity. In 2015 she was appointed professor and head of paediatrics and child health at the University of Sydney, and head of The Children's Hospital at Westmead Clinical School.
Rapid-onset gender dysphoria (ROGD) is a scientifically unsupported hypothesis which claims that some adolescents identify as transgender and experience gender dysphoria due to peer influence and social contagion. ROGD is not recognized as a valid mental health diagnosis by any major professional association, who discourage its use due to a lack of reputable scientific evidence for the concept, major methodological issues in existing research, and its stigmatization of gender-affirming care for transgender youth. The paper initially proposing the concept was based on surveys of parents of transgender youth recruited from three anti-trans websites; following its publication, it was re-reviewed and a correction was issued highlighting that ROGD is not a clinically validated phenomenon. Since the paper's publication, the concept has frequently been cited in legislative attempts to restrict the rights of transgender youth.
Elizabeth Jane Elliott is an Australian clinician scientist. She is a Member of the Order of Australia (AM), for services to paediatrics and child health, as well as an Elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Science (AAHMS), Fellow of the Royal Society of NSW, and Fellow of the Academy of Child and Adolescent Health. She was the first female to win the James Cook Medal, awarded by the Royal Society of NSW for contributions to human welfare. She is a Distinguished Professor of paediatrics at the University of Sydney and a Consultant Paediatrician at the Sydney Children’s Hospitals Network, Westmead, and regarded as a "pioneer in fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, advocacy and patient care".
Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters is a 2020 book by Abigail Shrier, published by Regnery Publishing, which endorses the controversial concept of rapid-onset gender dysphoria (ROGD). ROGD is not recognized as a medical diagnosis by any major professional institution nor is it backed by credible scientific evidence.
Dr. Edward O'Loughlin is an Australian paediatric gastroenterologist and a former national representative rower. As a sweep oarsman he was a 1974 national champion and an Australian representative in the men's eight at the 1974 World Championships. As a physician he has served as Head of Gastroenterology at Westmead Children's Hospital.
Our College [the RANZCP] specialises in standards and training. NAPP attends to any threat to our ability to treat our patients with the standard of care they need.
The RACP notes that there are substantial dangers posed by some of the proposals ... such as holding a national inquiry into the issue. A national inquiry would not increase the scientific evidence available regarding gender dysphoria but would further harm vulnerable patients and their families through increased media and public attention.