Cancer services

Find out about our comprehensive treatment options and support services available to cancer patients across our hospitals.

Where to find this service

Sunshine Hospital

Footscray Hospital

Williamstown Hospital

Melton Health Hub

Sunbury Community Hospital

Sunshine Hospital Radiation Therapy Centre

Bacchus Marsh Hospital

What we do

Western Health’s cancer service is the largest care provider for people with cancer across the wider Western region.

Sunshine Hospital is the primary cancer services hub, providing up to 20 inpatient beds on a shared ward. Patients with cancer are also admitted at Footscray, Williamstown and Bacchus Marsh Hospital for surgical procedures.

Melton Health and Community Services also provides support through your cancer diagnosis. This includes chemotherapy if indicated. Please note that there is no radiotherapy treatment available at Melton Health. This can be arranged to be done at Peter Mac at Sunshine by their Oncologist.

Chemotherapy

Chemotherapy is provided at Sunshine Chemotherapy Day Unit (CDU), Melton Health Day Medical Unit and Sunbury Day Hospital. Radiation Therapy are also provided at the Sunshine Hospital Radiation Therapy Centre, which is a service partnership with Peter McCallum Cancer Centre.

Oncology Hospital in the Home (HITH) provides oncology care at home where possible.

Emergency care

Emergency care is provided to cancer patients presenting at Sunshine, Footscray, Williamstown Emergency Departments (ED) and Bacchus Marsh and Melton Health Urgent Care. Sunshine Hospital also operates a Symptom Urgent Review Clinic (SURC), via the CDU, providing an alternative avenue to the ED to access acute specialised care for patients on chemotherapy.

Palliative care

Western Health provides inpatient palliative care at Sunshine Hospital with 20 dedicated palliative care beds. Regional Community Palliative Care is serviced by Bacchus Marsh Community Palliative Care Team. There is also inpatient palliative care at Bacchus Marsh.

Outpatient care, support services and treatment planning

Cancer outpatient services are available at Sunshine, Footscray, Sunbury and Melton Health.

Several key support services are involved in delivering care for cancer patients at Western Health. The Medical Imaging department provides imaging and interventional radiology services for patients with cancer. Additionally, the Western Health Pharmacy Department provides a chemotherapy compounding service at Sunshine Hospital, which is outsourced for Sunbury Day Hospital and Melton Health to Baxter and Slade, respectively.

Treatment planning plays an integral role in supporting positive outcomes from cancer care. Western Health cancer services operate high-quality tumour-specific multidisciplinary meetings, optimising treatment and management planning. Input occurs from multiple clinicians across relevant clinical specialties, including medical, radiation and surgical oncology, radiology, pathology, allied health and nursing.

Services and facilities

Our cancer services and clinics include:

acute inpatient services including medical oncology, haematology, chemotherapy and surgery
subacute inpatient palliative care
research and clinical trials
Symptom and Urgent Review Clinic (SURC)
non-admitted services, including specialist clinics and radiotherapy
community palliative care
Oncology Hospital in the Home (HITH) (provision of chemotherapy in the patient’s home)
allied health support.

Cancer services partnerships:

Peter Mac - We partner with Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre (Peter Mac) to provide radiation oncology service at SHRTC.

Mercy Palliative Care (MPC) - We partner with a range of community palliative care providers, including MPC, to provide essential end-of-life support and symptom management to a large portion of Western Health patients receiving cancer care.

Through patient-centred models, MPC provides community palliative care services in patients’ own homes, while WH operate inpatient palliative care at Sunshine and the multidisciplinary Symptom Management and Referral Team (SMART) clinics at Footscray and Sunshine campuses.

VCCC Alliance - Western Health is a member of the Victorian Comprehensive Cancer Centre Alliance (VCCC). The VCCC uses an integrated and innovative approach to cancer research, clinical trials, education and patient care in Victoria, with the aim to translate research into practice and advance quality clinical care.

Western Health is also part of the West Metropolitan Health Service Partnership (Mercy Health, Royal Women’s Hospital, Royal Children’s Hospital, Peter Mac and Melbourne Health) and the Western Central Melbourne Integrated Cancer Services (WCMICS) as well as North and West Metropolitan Palliative Care Consortium and Grampians Region Palliative Care Consortium.