The Yass Valley Pregnancy and Postnatal Care Centre is beginning to take shape as the Yass Maternity Enhancement Project begins.
The Eric Bell Centre and Shannon House at Yass Hospital are being renovated to be become a hub for local families to frequent before and after the birth of their child.
The finished result will feature enhanced, locally based, midwife led maternity support, with strong connections to birthing facilities at Goulburn and Queanbeyan hospitals.
The Yass Maternity Enhancement Project was created to deliver the new centre and expand midwifery services to improve access to safe, high-quality maternity care for women and families within the Yass Valley.
The project was created with the support of the NSW and Commonwealth governments, and will become a place to “support Yass Valley families to grow and flourish into the future”.
Funded by the Australian Government through a $4.7 million Commonwealth Federation Funding Agreement and delivered by NSW Health and Southern NSW Local Health District, the project also includes infrastructure upgrades to the Eric Bell Centre and service model enhancements.
With works already underway, the new facility is expected to be completed towards the end of 2026.
Once complete, the centre will provide a family-centred (non-birthing) maternity space, clinical consultation rooms, spaces for childbirth education and group programs, integrated maternity services (including antenatal and postnatal care, childbirth and parenting education, lactation consultant services, trauma-informed postnatal debriefing, and women’s and babies’ physiotherapy), access to midwifery continuity of care through a Midwifery Group Practice (MGP) that is based at Goulburn and Queanbeyan hospitals, and virtual care options to support families across the region.
The centre has been designed with the intention of delivering safe, high-quality, woman’ centred care by delivering strong clinical governance and safety systems, focusing on culturally safe and trauma-informed care, ongoing monitoring of access/experience and service outcomes and a staged implementation to support workforce and service safety.
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