A GP clinic housing four doctors is set to open on the ground floor of the new Swinton building next year under plans unveiled by Lyndoch Living.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
or signup to continue reading
The move will involve basing four GPs from the Warrnambool Medical Clinic at the new onsite clinic while the clinics on Liebig Street and at Target will remain.
Lyndoch chief executive officer Doreen Power said it was hoped the doors on the new facility - which would be available to the whole community - would open in January.
"What it'll do is start people coming to Lyndoch, coming to the GP clinic," Ms Power said.
She said once the new primary health centre was built at the site - which was expected to happen next year - the GPs would relocate to the new facility.
The Swinton GP clinic space would then be used for chronic disease management.
"We will use that space. Everything's evolving," Ms Power said.
She said the idea for the onsite GP clinic came when Lyndoch was approached by the Commonwealth Government to run the pop-up COVID-19 respiratory clinic in July.
While locating it in the new Swinton building was not an option, she said she began thinking about the possibility of locating a GP clinic onsite.
"It was just an opportunity. It was being innovative with the space," she said.
The Lava Street respiratory clinic was originally funded until September but has been extended until November, Ms Power said.
She said construction of the new primary healthcare centre building would employ an additional 100 people in the community.
"I think post-COVID this is what we really need in our community," she said.
In April last year, Lyndoch Living acquired the Warrnambool Medical Clinic which had been operating at the Liebig Street site since 1912.
Read more:
Our COVID-19 news articles relating to public health and safety are free for anyone to access. However, we depend on subscription revenue to support our journalism. If you are able, please subscribe here. If you are already a subscriber, thank you for your support.