Pre-Admission Clinic
Prior to surgery you may be required to attend pre-admission clinic. Preparing for surgery can feel overwhelming if you don’t know what to expect. Pre-admission clinic enables us to identify special requirements, answer your questions and complete all documentation and tests, making your day of surgery as stress free as possible.
The following information addresses the most commonly asked questions regarding day or overnight surgery.
On the day of Admission – What to expect
Your letter from the hospital will tell you the date, instructions on how to get your time for your admission and where to go when you arrive at the hospital. It may be a ward, admissions or the Day Surgery Unit. If you are unsure where to go when you arrive, ask at the main reception or information desk which is in the hospital’s main foyer. On arrival, your details will be checked by hospital staff. To help us provide quality care, we need to know complete and accurate details:
Pre-Admission
- Your medical history
- Details of any medicines you are taking
Day of Admission
- Your medical history
- Details of any medicines you are taking / bring your medication with you
- Current address and phone number
- Details of your general practitioner or other treating health professionals
- Pension or concession cards / your Medicare number
- Details of your private health cover or any other cover that might fund your hospital stay
- Details of any workers’ compensation claim
- Your need for an interpreter or cultural support worker
- Current advance health directive or enduring power of attorney, and copies of these documents
Cancel or change your appointment
If you are unable to make your admission date, or your address or contact details have changed, please call us on the number on the admission letter. It is important to let us know if you cannot attend for any reason, so that we can offer your appointment time to someone else in your community.
Planning your discharge (leaving hospital)
We plan for your discharge from the time you are admitted into hospital to help ensure it goes as smoothly as possible. Discharge planning is co-ordinated by members of the nursing and medical team. Please note that all patients are responsible for their transport home and if you having day surgery you are also responsible for ensuring there is a responsible adult with you for the 24 hours after your general anaesthetic. We aim to discharge patients by 10am however this will be confirmed closer to the day of discharge to allow you to make transport arrangements home.
In the event day case patients are unable to arrange a carer to take them home and remain with them for 24 hours they will be booked a bed. However if there are no available beds on the day of discharge these will be the first patients to be cancelled given they do not require acute nursing care overnight. Beds are prioritised to those that need to stay for clinical/safety reasons.