A Portland woman has been told to travel an hour away for the closest maternity services while deep in labour, two years after the same situation forced her to have a child on the side of the road.
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It was 4am on Monday, February 5 when Jessa Laws called Portland District Health to let it know she was about to give birth and was headed to the hospital.
She'd had seven contractions in 14 minutes and said she knew the baby was coming fast.
So when she was told for the second time the hospital was on birth diversion and she'd need to travel to Warrnambool, about 100 kilometres away, Ms Laws said she refused to leave.
"When I called up to inform the maternity unit I was in labour, they told me they're on bypass and I'd need to go to Warrnambool again," she said.
"I told her I wouldn't take no for an answer and that I'd be on my way in soon because I knew it would be another fast birth."
In just one hour and 47 minutes from the time of her first contraction, little Inara was born. Ms Laws said she was grateful, given the potential for complications.
"The midwives were great, I couldn't fault them, they were there waiting for me when I got there," she said.
"The issue was there was no anaesthetist. I didn't end up needing them, but when I was giving birth, there were some other complications where my daughter actually had the cord wrapped around her neck three times and I had an abnormal placenta.
"That increases the risk of post-partum haemorrhage. These were things which may have required emergency surgical intervention, but luckily nothing happened. It's just one of those things where it's just luck."
In 2022, Ms Laws gave birth to her daughter Astrid on the side of the road in Port Fairy, en-route to Warrnambool, after she was told PDH was on birth diversion.
She asked why it had happened again, two years on.
"I got put back in the same situation," Ms Laws said.
"The first message I got back saying birth diversions were in place, I actually got incredibly anxious, it definitely brought back a lot of emotions from Astrid's birth.
"There was no other information on the message, like what to do if you're in active labour or if you had concerns.
"I actually messaged the number back and got quite upset, and asked if it was for all births or just cesareans, but I was told it was for all births and there were no anaesthetist.
"...Every birth is different, you can't run the risk of sending women over to Warrnambool or Hamilton and ending up in a situation like I did because it will end badly one day."
It's been a tough few months for the health service after it lost its CEO and CFO in a double blow in December last year.
Health Minister Mary-Anne Thomas last month acknowledged to The Standard the hospital was experiencing some challenges.
"Portland has some unique challenges when it comes to recruitment and retention of staff, I'm not going to shy away from that, but they're not the only health service that is experiencing that," she said.
But she said the state government was committed to building a strong health workforce, with "a number of initiatives under way."
Member for South West Coast Roma Britnell said a fix needed to be delivered, fast.
"Two years ago a woman gave birth on the side of the road and that is not something we should ever see in Victoria," she said.
"Having been pregnant with her next child she was nervous and rightfully so, because the hospital was often on diversion and the day she had the baby she had to make the decision to go there and was told they couldn't guarantee they could deliver the services she needed.
"Anaesthetists weren't available so an emergency cesarean wasn't possible. We're not in 1850 where you have to be concerned about your child and your safety in a hospital system.
"We had this brought to the attention of the government over two years ago and the minister for health at the time said he'd appointed a chairman and it was sorted.
"Two years on, it hasn't been sorted because the mother didn't give birth on the side of the road, but certainly didn't have the confidence she needed to have in the health system that it would be there for her and had to make the difficult situation of saying 'I'll take the risk'."
Portland District Health did not respond by deadline.
