Echuca District Hospital (Adoptions)

Echuca District Hospital history in brief

• 1882 First patient admitted to hospital
• 1890 New south wing of the hospital was built
• 1907 Operating Theatre, Nurses Home and Doctors’ accommodation constructed
• 1925 Installation of the first x-ray plant
• 1938 Opening of Camray Ward
• 1962 Construction of Midwifery Unit – Rose Baker Wing
• 1965 Soldiers’ Memorial Wing refurbished to geriatric ward
• 1968 The opening of Johnstone Wing
• 1970 Physiotherapy and Occupational Therapy services commenced
• 1975 Establishment of the new Day Hospital
• 1978 Lumeah Nursing Home opened
• 1993 Echuca District Hospital became Echuca Regional Health
• 1999 Completion of the Hopwood Centre (Primary Care)
• 2003 Glanville Village aged care service opened
• 2006 Opening of the Alan Henry Thrum Operating Theatre
• 2008 Official opening of the Community Rehabilitation Centre
• 2009 Commencement of Master Plan process for new hospital
• 2010 Feasibility study and schematic designs commenced
• 2011 $65.6 million secured for hospital redevelopment
• 2011 Echuca Regional Health Education Centre is established
• 2012 Construction commenced on the new and expanded Echuca hospital
• 2014 Official opening of the new Echuca hospital stage one
• 2015 Completion and official opening of stage two
• 2016 Installation of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)
• 2017 Opening of the Short Stay Unit and new ERH Public Café
• 2019 ERH wins the Victorian Public Healthcare Award for the ‘whole of hospital model for responding to family violence’ as lead across Murray Cluster
• 2020 Funding is secured for new Echuca Regional Health Cancer and Wellness Centre
• 2021 Construction commences for the new Cancer and Wellness Centre in July
• 2021 ERH appointment of first female CEO
• 2022 Cancer and Wellness Centre opens to patients in November.

Warning about distressing information

This guide contains information that some people may find distressing. If you experienced abuse as a child or young person in an institution mentioned in this guide, it may be a difficult reading experience. Guides may also contain references to previous views, policies and practices that are regrettable and do not reflect the current views, policies or practices of the department or the State of Victoria. If you find this content distressing, please consult with a support person either from the Department of Justice and Community Safety or another agency.

Disclaimer

Please note that this administrative history is provided for general information only and does not purport to be comprehensive. The department does not guarantee the accuracy of this administrative history. For more information on the history of child welfare in Australia, visit the Find & Connect website.

Sources

Echuca Regional Health website, www.erh.org.au/about/history-of-erh/ viewed 1 April 2025.

List of records held by the department

For information relating to the central management of care leavers and wards of state, please consult the guide Central department wardship and out-of-home care records. These collections date back to the 1860s and include ward registers, index cards and ward files.

Defunct agency adoption records (Adoption Information Service) (1920–82)

File; Permanent (VPRS Number 17943 / P0001)

Content: The Adoption Act 1984 allowed approved agencies to arrange and negotiate the adoption of children. It also required that agencies keep certain records. If an agency’s approval or operations ceased, their records were to be forwarded to the Secretary of the Department.

The Act also required the Department to establish an adoption information service (AIS), with access to both records created by the Department and the records of the former approved agencies. The adoption records now held by the Department were created by as many as 30 different adoption agencies that were in operation at different times. After the AIS was formed, circa 1985, it gathered the records of the various former agencies, numbered the files sequentially with an “A” prefix and created a full index.

Other AIS unnumbered adoption files and card indexes were transferred at a later date. The records management unit allocated these records different numbering systems. The categories of files were grouped by the adoption agency they related to and the function of the file. Some of the file sequences also hold an "A" prefix as adoption files. However, the numbering system is separate to the first collection transferred from the AIS.

Content of files will vary but may include.

• Application to Adopt form
• Documents and correspondence supporting the application
• Consent to Adopt and correspondence
• Legal documents
• Birth certificates
• Photographs.

One sequence of files is attributed to the Echuca Hospital:

• File numbers A1050 – A1070.