{"id":698415,"date":"2026-05-27T18:47:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T18:47:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/698415\/"},"modified":"2026-05-27T18:47:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T18:47:10","slug":"work-not-yet-started-on-1-5m-expansion-to-hunter-river-patient-medical-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/698415\/","title":{"rendered":"Work not yet started on $1.5M expansion to Hunter River patient medical home"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Work on the proposed expansion to the Hunter River patient medical home has not begun, despite $1.5 million allocated in the government’s latest capital budget. <\/p>\n

During question period Tuesday, Green Party Leader Matt MacFarlane said a local group has spent nearly three years trying to expand the Central Queens Health Centre into a larger patient medical home that could take more Islanders off the provincial patient registry, but is \u201cbeing blocked at every turn.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey’re certainly not being blocked,\u201d Health Minister Cory Deagle said in the legislature. \u201cI’m hoping to make an announcement next month.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Deagle did not provide details on the expansion during question period, he pointed to the $1.5 million commitment in the capital budget and said the work \u201cwill be\u201d done.<\/p>\n

MacFarlane said expanding the clinic\u2019s physical footprint is critical if the province wants to attract more doctors and nurse practitioners to the area.<\/p>\n

He said the community group behind the project has repeatedly revised its plans at the request of authorities.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese people have done everything that they’ve been asked to do,\u201d MacFarlane told reporters on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s just frustrating when you have those pieces in place, you have the community, you’ve got the facility, you’ve got the desire to grow, you’ve got the people willing to do it, but yet almost three years later we’re not seeing the fruits of the labour of the community.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AnMacFarlane describes the South Shore Health and Wellness Clinic in Crapaud as a proven ‘if you build it, they will come’ success story that has already expanded and attracted multiple health professionals. (Thinh Nguyen\/CBC)<\/p>\n

MacFarlane added that there is land available to expand the Central Queens Health Centre and said modernized facilities are essential to recruiting health-care workers.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you don’t have the space, you don’t get the health-care professionals to come out,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He pointed to his experience on the board of the South Shore Health and Wellness Clinic in Crapaud, one of the province\u2019s patient medical homes, as a model for what could happen in Hunter River.<\/p>\n

He said the Crapaud clinic got to where it is now through \u201cmany years of advocacy\u201d and local residents pushing for it dating back to the previous Liberal government.<\/p>\n

Over time, he said, the Crapaud clinic has undergone at least two expansions to its original footprint, which has helped draw more health professionals.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you build it, they will come,\u201d MacFarlane said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 3 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":698416,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[64,63,137,500],"class_list":["post-698415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-health","tag-healthcare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=698415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/698415\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/698416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=698415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=698415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=698415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}