By Dongyun Kwon
Bev Schmolling, best known for her contribution to the Save Healesville Hospital Action Group (SHHAG), died on Friday 29 March.
Now known as the Services for Healesville Hospital Action Group after the operating theatre was successfully saved, Ms Schmolling’s legacy lives on through the group members who remember her fondly, and through the renal dialysis unit she campaigned for at the Healesville Hospital.
SHHAG chair Jane Judd said Ms Schmolling was an awesome woman.
“My own personal work with Bev started in 2012, but her story of community activity precedes that,” she said.
“She was a hardworking stalwart and we were all impressed by her dedication to the community and its needs.”
In 2012, Ms Schmolling joined SHHAG as a foundation member, seeking to expand, maintain and revive Healesville Hospital and Community Health Service after dire plans were proposed to close down vital services like the operating theatre and the birthing services on site.
“At the end of 2012, Eastern Health said they were going to close the operating theatre and the maternity services and there was a large backlash from the community,” Ms Judd said.
“We held a public meeting in December 2012, 350 people turned up and we formed a committee. The purpose of that committee was to maintain existing services and expand services.
“We worked together to advocate choice to health for what we believed our community needed.”
In the end, local access to birthing at Healesville Hospital was lost, but the operating theatre was maintained.
While Eastern Health was reducing services, Ms Schmolling knew there was a need for new services after she had gotten through her personal experience accessing renal dialysis services for her husband.
Ms Schmolling single-handedly won funding for renal dialysis services which are onsite today.
Ms Judd said her friend was pleased whenever family members of renal disease patients thanked her for bringing the renal dialysis unit in Healesville.
“Her husband had developed kidney failure and they needed to access renal dialysis. When Ms Schmolling was trying to find out where she had to take her husband, she discovered it was quite a long way away from Healesville,” she said.
“She initially started by lobbying for a renal dialysis centre at Maroondah [Hospital], which was successful, and they did establish that.
“When her husband finally passed away from his kidney failure, she decided that it was important to get renal dialysis units at Healesville Hospital, so she wrote countless letters to the multiple ministers.”
Ms Schmolling’s love for the Yarra Valley grew after she moved to Healesville in 1965.
She and her husband had Murray Grey cattle on their property and she loved those cattle.
She was actively involved in promoting the breed and ended up receiving the honour of life membership from the Murray Grey Beef Cattle Society in 1986.
