Referral to emergency

If any of the following are present or suspected, please refer the patient to the emergency department (via ambulance if necessary) or seek emergent medical advice if in a remote region.

  • suspected deep tissue infection (presence of bullae, necrosis, or subcutaneous emphysema)
  • suspected necrotising fasciitis
  • facial or orbital cellulitis
  • rapidly progressing infection
  • rapidly progressing haematoma
  • underlying vascular or tendon injury
  • hand infections - fingertip, flexor tendon infection, abscess
  • deep penetrating injury
  • skin threating injury e.g. haematoma, large skin tear
  • soft tissue loss greater than 5cm2
  • uncontrolled pain after analgesia
  • numbness, weakness, or lack of perfusion distal to injury
  • lack of systemic or local response to oral antibiotics
  • soft tissue injury with systemic features including:
    • febrile greater than 38o
    • haemodynamic instability
    • positive blood cultures
    • rising or unchanging C-reactive protein (CRP) and/or white cell count (WCC) despite antibiotics
    • hypotension
    • tachycardia

For clinical advice, please telephone the relevant specialty service.

Women's and Children's Health Network

Category 1 - appointment clinically indicated within 30 days

  • acute wound reviews including:
    • soft tissue trauma
    • haematoma
    • abscess of upper limb, face, earlobe, head, and neck
    • trauma related delayed healing, lacerations, or wounds

Category 2 — appointment clinically indicated within 90 days

  • chronic wounds
  • conditions causing recurrent infections

Category 3 — appointment clinically indicated within 365 days

  • nil

Essential referral information

Completion required before first appointment to ensure patients are ready for care. Please indicate in the referral if the patient is unable to access mandatory tests or investigations as they incur a cost or are unavailable locally.

  • past medical/surgical history
  • current medications and dosages
  • allergies and sensitivities
  • presenting symptoms
  • management history including:
    • onset and duration
    • severity
    • pain
    • associated features, e.g. functional impairment and range of motion
    • treatments trialled/implemented prior to referral
  • photograph, including disposable measurement tool – with patient’s consent, where secure image transfer, identification and storage is possible

Clinical management advice

Women’s and Children’s Hospital (WCH) Plastic and Reconstructive surgery service department holds consultant led outpatient clinics twice weekly.

This is a guideline for outpatient referral only. If you have clinical concerns, please contact the WCH Plastic and Reconstructive surgery service via switchboard on (08) 8161 7000

Clinical resources

Consumer resources

Reason for request

  • to establish a diagnosis
  • for treatment or intervention
  • for advice and management
  • for specialist to take over management
  • for a specified test/investigation the General Practitioner cannot order
  • for other reason (e.g. rapidly accelerating disease progression)
  • transfer of care from another tertiary service
  • clinical judgement indicates a referral for specialist review is necessary.

Patient demographic details

  • full name, including aliases
  • date of birth
  • residential and postal address
  • telephone contact number/s – home, mobile and alternative
  • Medicare number, where eligible
  • name of the parent or caregiver, if appropriate
  • preferred language and interpreter requirements
  • identifies as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander

Clinical modifiers

  • impact on employment
  • impact on education
  • impact on home
  • impact on activities of daily living
  • impact on ability to care for others
  • impact on personal frailty or safety
  • identifies as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander

Other relevant information

  • Willingness to have surgery, where surgery is a likely intervention.
  • Choice to be treated as a public or private patient.
  • Compensable status, e.g. DVA, Work Cover, Motor Vehicle Insurance, etc.
  • Relevant social history, including identifying if you feel your patient is from a vulnerable population, under guardianship/out-of-home care arrangements and/or requires a third party to receive correspondence on their behalf.
  • Triage of a specialist outpatient referral is based on clinical decision making to allocate an appropriate urgency categorisation.
  • Where appropriate and where available, the referral may be streamed to an associated public allied health and/or nursing service. Access to some specific services may include initial assessment and management by associated public allied health and/or nursing, which may either facilitate or negate the need to see the public medical specialist.
  • A change in patient circumstance (such as condition deteriorating or pregnancy) may affect the urgency categorisation and should be communicated as soon as possible.
  • All new referrals will be triaged by a consultant and appointment times scheduled according to clinical urgency.

Adolescents transitioning from paediatric to adult specialist services require a formal handover from paediatric specialist clinician to adult specialist clinician as well as a formal referral from the referring specialist to ensure initial transfer of care is completed.

The General Practitioners role in this process is to provide support to patients as part of holistic care. All ongoing referrals to specialists can subsequently be provided by the General Practitioner once the transfer of care has occurred.