Westmead Hospital is a major teaching hospital in Sydney, Australia. Opened on 10 November 1978, the 975-bed hospital forms part of the Western Sydney Local Health District, and is a teaching hospital of Sydney Medical School at the University of Sydney.

The hospital serves a population of 1.85m people and is located on one of the largest health and hospital campuses in Australia. In 2016/17, Westmead Hospital provided more than 1.5m occasions of care to outpatients, in addition to approximately 107,000 inpatients. Annually, there are over 21,000 medical operations, almost 5,800 births, and more than 75,000 presentations to emergency department.

Westmead Hospital is located on the junction of Darcy and Hawkesbury Roads in Westmead and provides a full range of tertiary medical and dental services except for paediatrics which is serviced by the adjacent Children's Hospital at Westmead, relocated from Camperdown to Westmead in 1995. The Hospital includes a large Dental Clinical School and extensive clinical pathology and medical research facilities. From 1995 to 2017 the statewide NETS (NSW), the Newborn and paediatric Emergency Transport Service was hosted at Westmead Hospital, prior to moving to make way for a new acute services block for the hospital.

Located nearby are the Cumberland Hospital (providing outpatient and inpatient psychiatric care) and Westmead Private Hospital, a division of Ramsay Health Care.

History

Parramatta
The history of health service in western Sydney began with a tent hospital established in Parramatta to meet the medical needs of convicts, military personnel, and early settlers in 1789. The hospital at Parramatta saw many changes over the years, firstly in 1818, it was known as the Colonial Hospital and later, in 1897, the hospital was expanded and became known as the Parramatta District Hospital.

As population expanded in Sydney's west, the services provided at Parramatta became inadequate to meet demand. The hospital was the first major tertiary referral health centre in outer Sydney. Prior to its existence, referral health services were provided in inner-city centres such as the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, the Prince of Wales Hospital, Sydney Hospital, Royal North Shore Hospital and St Vincent's Hospital.

The Westmead Hospital, initially known as the Westmead Centre, was established on 10 November 1978 (opened by Premier Neville Wran with former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam as guest of honour), changing the role of Parramatta Hospital.

Acute services were relocated to Westmead Hospital with the Parramatta building continuing to function as the rehabilitation arm of Westmead Hospital. In 1991, all services moved out of the old Parramatta Hospital and in 1995 the building was decommissioned and redeveloped into the Parramatta Justice Precinct. Parramatta Community Health Centre, located in Jeffery House, still operates on part of the original site.

Area Health Services
Westmead Hospital, together with the Parramatta Hospital, was initially governed by a local hospital Board. When local boards were restructured into Area Health Services by the New South Wales state government, Westmead Hospital became part of the Western Sydney Area Health Service, together with Westmead Dental Hospital, Cumberland Hospital (mental health services), district hospitals at Blacktown, Auburn and Mount Druitt. In 2005, the boundaries of the Area Health Services were changed, and, up until 31 December 2010, Westmead Hospital was one of two tertiary teaching hospitals (together with Nepean Hospital in Penrith), part of the Sydney West Area Health Service.

Local Hospital District
Following the formation of Local Health Networks on 1 January 2011, Westmead Hospital became part of the Western Sydney Local Health District, together with Westmead Dental Hospital, and district hospitals at Blacktown, Auburn and Mount Druitt.

Major refurbishments
In 2004, a contract worth in excess of A$142 million for refurbishment and development of new facilities at Westmead Hospital was awarded to Thiess. As works were nearly completion in July 2007, NSW Minister for Health, Reba Meagher together with NSW Member for Parramatta Tanya Gadiel inspected the new Women's Health and Newborn Care Centre that provides a new birthing unit, special care nursery and neonatal intensive care unit, 41 bed maternity ward, antenatal and gynaecology inpatient wards and ambulatory care clinics in the one location. It is expected that by 2011, more than 5,000 babies will be born at Westmead Hospital each year.

Refurbishment of cancer wards at Westmead Hospital occurred at around the same time; based on the US-style comprehensive cancer centre model which combines cutting-edge services with a patient-friendly approach. In 2011, the facilities were renamed as the Crown Princess Mary Cancer Centre Westmead. Inspecting the facilities during 2007, Ms Meagher stated: 
This means that patient care at every level will be organised to ensure smooth transition between hospital inpatient services, community treatment or palliative care as people's care needs change. The co-location of a range of speciality cancer services means patients will be able to receive diagnoses and a range of treatments and rehabilitation without the need to make separate trips.
Other facilities to be refurbished under the Theiss contract included facilities for intensive care and renal treatments.

In March 2012, a food-court style emporium was opened on the ground level precinct introducing a wide variety of cuisines to the standard hospital fare, including a sweets and desserts cafe, kebabs, pizza, fresh salads and sandwich bar, gelato station, and various selections of hot foods. A number of retail stores including a hair and beauty salon, phones outlet, pharmacy and convenience store is also under development.

Services

As well as General Wards, there are a range of high dependency wards at Westmead Hospital including a Coronary Care Unit, an Intensive Care Unit, a Special Care Nursery, High Dependency Wards, and a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. For a full list of service, refer to the table in links below.

Westmead Emergency Department is one of the busiest in Australia seeing over 52,000 adult patients annually. It is supported by tertiary specialist services including 24 hours and 7 days a week interventional cardiology, trauma services, cardiothoracic surgery, neurosurgery and toxicology.

Westmead Medical Research Foundation provides fundraising support and community advocacy for medical research and patient care at Westmead.

Westmead Hospital is the base for the New South Wales helicopter operations of CareFlight air ambulance service. Its aircraft and trained medical and operational crews respond to emergencies threatening the life, health and safety of people caused through medical emergency, illness, natural disaster, accidents or mishap. Within Westmead Hospital exists the Trauma Service, which provides research and education of injury prevention, and death statistics.

Teaching and research
Since its establishment in 1978, the Westmead Clinical School of Sydney University at Westmead Hospital has been a place of innovation and growth. The Faculty of Medicine is Australia's oldest and largest medical faculty (established as Sydney Medical School in 1856) undertaking teaching and research in health and medicine of international standing. As part of the Western Clinical School, teaching facilities at Westmead form an integral part of education as the largest of the University's centres of clinical care in Sydney. The University supported the establishment of research clinicians in all key staff specialist postings at the hospital in 1978.

The Hospital accepted its first dental patients in 1980. The Westmead Hospital Dental Clinical School (now the Westmead Centre for Oral Health) has become a major facility for the Faculty of Dentistry for both undergraduate and postgraduate education and training.

Medical research has been taking place at Westmead Hospital since the early 1980s. In 1996, medical research facilities were consolidated through the establishment of the Westmead Millennium Institute for Medical Research (WMI). Initially with just 60 scientists and doctors, the Institute now has over 450 medical research scientists.

Controversies 
On 7 February 2023, a team of doctors from Westmead Institute of Medical Research, Westmead Children's Hospital, and Westmead Clinical School led by Joseph Elkadi, Catherine Chudleigh, and Ann M. Maguire published a controversial article in the pediatric journal 'Children' which purported to examine the developmental pathway and clinical outcomes of 79 transgender children who presented at the hospital's gender service.  Despite a broad medical consensus of the world's largest medical associations, the authors sensationally concluded that gender affirming healthcare is, in effect, "iatrogenic” and a “non-standard risky approach”.  Their conclusions, which run counter to more than 30 international peak medical bodies, were widely repeated in numerous articles in the Australian right-wing press exciting "legal and safety fears" over gender-affirming healthcare.  The press coverage also attracted several thousand highly pejorative public comments about gender diverse children and adults, and their treating physicians.  

Westmead's study was subsequently analysed and refuted by the peak body for transgender healthcare in Australia, the Australian New Zealand Professional Association for Transgender Health (AusPATH) in a response letter dated 1 March, 2023.  The letter accused the study's authors of "significant bias" and identified a range of methodological flaws and misrepresentations in the Westmead study.  AusPATH also accused Westmead's authors of using "discredited literature" and citing fringe medical groups such as the "National Association of Practicing Psychiatrists" - which is widely considered to be a medico-religious lobby group associated with the Australian Christian Lobby and has a medical position statement on gender affirming care that cites social media sources such as reddit, youtube, and facebook, as its original medical research.  The study's authors were also criticised for using "de-humanising" anti-trans language and for "pathologising" gender diversity in a discriminatory way.

In 2022, 14-year old transgender youth Noah O'brien presented to Westmead with gender dysphoria, seeking care.  The Hospital refused gender-affirming healthcare, and Noah subsequently died by suicide.  The hospital declined to comment on the matter when approached by the media.

Several LGBTI Human Rights Groups pointed out that the Westmead study runs counter to the NSW Health Strategy for transgender young people, and questioned whether Westmead was fit to continue treating transgender children and adolescents in a non-discriminatory and therapeutically beneficial way.

See also 
 Healthcare in Australia
 Lists of hospitals
 List of hospitals in Australia

References

External links
 Westmead Hospital
 Westmead Millennium Institute for Medical Research
 Sydney University, Faculty of Medicine, Western Clinical School
 Westmead Medical Research Foundation
 Brain Dynamics Centre
 Centre for Vision Research
 Institute for Clinical Pathology and Medical Research
CareFlight International

Hospitals in Sydney
Teaching hospitals in Australia
Hospitals established in 1978
Sydney Medical School
1978 establishments in Australia