Solar panels at Hornsby Hospital
Hornsby Ku-ring-gai Hospital soaks up the sun Hornsby Ku-ring-gai Hospital has gone solar now boasting the largest solar photovoltaic (PV) system on a healthcare facility in Australia. The green initiative is part of a statewide solar program which was launched by Minister for Environment and local Member of Parliament (Hornsby), Matt Kean, and Minister for Health, Brad Hazzard in January.
As HKH has a large roof space and relatively new buildings, the campus was selected to be one of the first hospitals in the state to have solar energy, with an estimated combined size of 865 kilowatts (kW). The system will yield over one million kWs of power per year, saving $250,000 and 900 tonnes of carbon emissions every year.
Supportive care nurse provides bridge between cardiology and palliative care
For Vincenzo Tassone, his independence has always been important and he wasn’t going to let something like heart failure keep him off his feet for too long. The former Willoughby fruit shop owner has benefitted from working with Cardiac Supportive Care Transitional Nurse Practitioner Kelly Hanvey, allowing him to live at home with his wife Barbara at his side and avoid hospital. Barbara said Kelly had proven a godsend, providing Vincenzo and herself with an outlet for questions and also acting as a conduit for other needs. “She’s been very good, she rings up and checks on him and we’ve been referred to other services as well,” Barbara said. “When he was in hospital, Kelly came to see him a couple of times but he’s managed to be out of hospital for quite a few weeks now while working with her.” In the five short months since commencing in the role Kelly has already seen benefits for patients like Vincenzo and countless others. “I’m here to help create that bridge between cardiology and palliative care,” Kelly said. “Heart failure patients are living a lot longer than they might have a few years ago, meaning older patients can be living with an increased symptom burden. Palliative care services are experts at managing some of those symptoms that patients with heart failure may have.” A cardiac nurse with more than 20 years of experience, Kelly’s new role involves everything
Nurse Practitioner Kelly with patient Vincenzo
from home visits to referring patients to services like physiotherapy, social work and OT. Linking with Royal North Shore, Ryde and Hornsby hospitals, Kelly has developed a simple aim; starting the journey earlier to help make it easier. “We’re hoping to improve quality of life and symptom control for patients. We’re also hoping to reduce readmission rates into hospital and avoidance of ICU, develop collaborative and integrated services” she said. “It’s not about end of life care, it’s about supportive care and it should start at an earlier phase of the patient journey.” For more information on the cardiac supportive care model, please contact Kelly on 0427 312 302 between 8am to 4.30pm Monday to Thursday.
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