Endoscopic Services

Western Health Endoscopic Services provides a comprehensive range of diagnostic and therapeutic endoscopy procedures for the benefit of inpatients and outpatients of Western Health. Procedures are performed across 3 campuses: Footscray Hospital, Sunshine Hospital and Sunbury Community Hospital.

​We aim to provide high quality, safe, timely, efficient and accessible endoscopic services to patients in the West. We offer our patients excellence in the latest endoscopic techniques, some of which make it possible to avoid surgery in many cases. Most of our endoscopic services are for upper or lower gastrointestinal (GI) cancer prevention, diagnosis, exclusion or treatment.

Western Health Endoscopic Services is a training and teaching centre for basic and advanced procedures. We train gastroenterology and surgical registrars, an interventional endoscopy fellow, respiratory registrars and a nurse colonoscopist. Patients may have their procedure performed by a trainee or registrar, under the supervision of a qualified specialist.  

Please be advised that the Endoscopy lists at Footscray and Sunshine Hospitals are reserved for interventional endoscopy or complex cases that need to be performed in a tertiary hospital environment or for patients whose anaesthetic risk is considered too great for the Sunbury Community Hospital environment for example those with a high BMI or severe cardiac or respiratory comorbidities.

Due to the demand we are experiencing for high acuity procedures and/or from high acuity patients, we are unfortunately unable to accommodate requests for procedures to be performed at either Footscray or Sunshine Hospitals for convenience if the patient is able to have their procedure at our Community Day Hospital, which is also part of Western Health.

• ​Gastroscopy
• Colonoscopy
• Flexible Sigm​oidoscopy
• ERCP (Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangio Pancreatography)
• EUS (Endoscopic Ultrasound)
• EMR (Endoscopic Mucosal Resection)
• PEG (Percutaneous Endoscopic Gastrostomy)
• Upper GI and Lower GI Luminal Stent Insertion
• Push Enteroscopy
• Capsule Endoscopy
• Bronchoscopy
• EBUS (Endobronchial Ultrasound)
• Anal Manometry

There is a high demand for gastrointestinal endoscopy services. Therefore, it is essential to identify those patients that need procedures more urgently.

All requests for procedures are triaged so those that are more urgent or those with the highest likelihood of significant pathology are prioritized.

The service supports the recently published 2017/8 Victorian Colonoscopy/Upper Endoscopy Categorisation Guidelines that the Victorian Department of Heath and Human Services has implemented as of the July 2018.

These standardised guidelines assist all Victorian public health services to ensure that GI endoscopy patients are prioritised in a similar manner, irrespective of the specialist or health service to which they are referred.

The Direct Access to Gastrointestinal Endoscopic Procedures (DAGE) pathways and symptom guidelines help the referer to identify patients who have a higher likelihood of significant pathology and to help reduce the number of unnecessary endoscopy referrals. ​

Endoscopy Booking Service
Phone: 8345 6015
Fax: 8345 7378
Email: wh-endoscopybookings@wh.org.au

Endoscopy Liaison Nurses
Phone: 0401 464 724 or 8345 6775
Fax: 8345 7378
Email: wh-endoscopybookings@wh.org.au