Peel Health Hub advocate uses facility’s fifth anniversary to call for funding for expansion

A Peel mental health service is bursting at the seams, as staff call for government funding that could help an extra 3000 people a year.

Peel Health Hub opened in 2018 following a community push for local mental health support after a spate of youth suicides, and offers a range of services including the Peel Youth Medical Service, counselling, an alcohol and drug service and job training.

Eleanor Britton, who works for hub-based GP Down South, said demand had skyrocketed over the past five years.

“All the services in this building are suffering from waitlists, from lack of space,” she said.

“Every organisation in the facility has seen exponential growth in need and in the number of clients that we’re servicing.

“We’re lucky that the model that we operate enables us to see everybody straightaway, but it doesn’t take the pressure off the clinicians that are working here really hard.”

Just three years after Peel Health Hub opened, GP Down South and fellow provider Allambee Counselling put forward a business case for an expansion, known as the Peel Health Hub 2.0, in an effort to address demand.

But with no funding forthcoming in the three years since, they have been forced to revise the business case because of skyrocketing building costs. What could have been a $19.8 million expansion is now estimated at closer to $28m to $30m.

Ms Britton had proposed to develop vacant land behind the hub — owned by the City of Mandurah — to expand the Health Hub building and associated services, including the recently added specialised eating disorder service that is the first of its kind outside the Perth metropolitan area.

The expansion would also have space for other new providers, allow 40,000 more visits and cater to an additional 3000 clients.

“We need more of all of these types of services and we need to bring new services,” she said.

“It’s really difficult work, and there’s sort of no end to it. So it would be great to be able to have those extra resources, and extra space, and extra services to support what’s already happening.”

Ms Britton said the hub catered to the “missing middle” of patients, particularly young people who would otherwise potentially present at an emergency department.

“Because of the model of care that we operate here, and the support that we have, from all the agencies working in the building, we can manage those young people and keep them out of emergency departments and out of hospital,” she said.

“There’s always more that we can do in mental health and the AOD (alcohol and other drugs) space as well; family and domestic violence is a huge issue in the Peel region.

“I think we have a lot of services here, we’re all working really well together, we just need to expand what we have and bring more complementary services in as well.”

The hub was built using local, state and federal government funding and Ms Britton is calling on all levels of government to fund the expansion “as soon as possible”.

“I would hope that in the spirit of working together, that we could look at this as a bipartisan project, and address the need that’s in the community now, and I’d be really hopeful that we can get this off the ground and running sooner than later,” she said.

Mandurah MLA David Templeman described the Peel Health Hub as an “outstanding success” and said he was committed to supporting the business case for the expansion.

“I meet regularly with the Peel Health Hub and strongly support a stage two expansion and support the suite of health services delivered in the Peel Region,” Mr Templeman said.

“The business case is strong, and I will advocate for a State contribution to stage two.”

A spokeswoman for Canning MHR Andrew Hastie said while he supported the work of the Peel Health Hub, his current focus was on realising upgrades to Peel Health Campus.

Mandurah Mayor Rhys Williams said the city “strongly supports the work of the Peel Health Hub” and had been in discussions with GP Down South about the expansion plans.

“We will be at the table and part of these discussions as the planning progresses,” he said.

Ms Britton has also requested State Government funding for two salaried GP positions at the hub, which she said would “reimburse them for the really difficult and complex work” their patients present.

Rupert Backhouse is one of only two GPs at the hub who as bulk-billing clinicians are paid depending on the number of clients seen, and said salaried positions would be an incentive to attract more GPs.

“I actually think we need more than two. My dream, my vision would be that we had say, four salaried GPs,” he said.

“What that will do is it will enable both variety in terms of choice of GPs, but also cover sick leave or holiday leave and provide a comprehensive service.”