For almost as long as he can remember, Ian Plush's life has involved visits to hospitals and specialist doctors.
Diagnosed with diabetes at the age of four, the now 58-year-old from Nuriootpa spent a good portion of his early life managing a condition which, at the time, didn't have the widespread awareness it has today.
"...Going back then, the early '70s... there wasn't much known about diabetes, so that was a difficulty on its own," shared Ian, who sat down last week to share his perspective on The Leader's campaign for a new Barossa Hospital, and what a regional hospital would mean for him and others like him.
"We battled along with it, did what the doctors were saying and trying to manage it, and for a long time there, the insulin I was on was doing a really good thing."
In his teenage years, Ian's insulin changed from pork-based to synthetic, which for him, brought about another round of challenges.
"My body didn't like that. It was happy for a couple of years, and then it would become immune to it," he explained.
"So I was seeing lots and lots of doctors and running around, trying to find other insulins that were going to work for me. That went on right through high school and even into my late 30s, early 40s, and then... the diabetes started to destroy my kidneys."
It became clear to Ian's doctors in September 2009 that Ian would need dialysis and an eventual kidney and pancreas transplant if he was going to survive.
For two years while on the transplant wait list, Ian underwent daily peritoneal dialysis, which involved being hooked up to a machine for 10 hours at home every night.
It was a difficult time, as he fought to maintain a level of health and quality of life in the hope new organs would eventually become available for him, all the while trying to hold down his job as an electrician.
"You've got to get to a certain level of sickness to be able to register for a transplant, but also be healthy enough to be able to accept the transplant. So it's a really fine balance," Ian said.
"I was seeing specialists every two or three months, which is a big saga, and having to travel down on the train, because around hospitals car parking is hopeless.
"I was still trying to manage my work and keep up with that, and it gets costly to have a day off every six or eight weeks to go in and see doctors and have tests and have all sorts of stuff.
"In the lead up to my transplant, or being able to register for a transplant, there's a whole heap of checks and balances that have to happen.
"There's x-rays, there's scans, then I had to have my wisdom teeth removed, because they were growing at an awkward angle, which could cause risks to the transplant...
"Then I had to have a fistula put in for the possibility of having to have haemodialysis, then before I went onto dialysis I had to have another surgery to put a tube into what they call a bag which is around your kidney and liver, to allow my peritoneal dialysis to work.
"So all those surgeries had to line up before I could even get on to dialysis.
"Then when I was on dialysis, every two or three months (I was) into Adelaide to make sure the dialysis was doing what it needed to do, the insulin was doing what it needed to do and those sorts of things, to keep me going."
On September 11, 2011, Ian finally received the life-saving organs he had waited so long for, travelling to Sydney with less than 24 hours notice for the six and a half hour operation.
While the gratitude he feels for what he's called his "second chance at life" is deep and heartfelt - so much so he has become a dedicated advocate for organ and tissue authority Donate Life - as an organ transplant recipient, Ian's medical needs are ongoing.
Specialist appointments for doctors relating to his diabetes and transplant, as well as for other serious side effects caused by his essential medications, feature regularly on his calendar, and will do so for the rest of his life.
"It will be with me for the rest of my days. I don't mind going in just for check ups, because if we do these routine check ups, if something is not quite right, we can act on it sooner than later... It's a necessary evil," Ian said.
But time for those visits does come at a cost, says Ian, noting that next week in particular he has three specialist appointments three days in a row, all around lunch time, effectively stopping his ability to work for those days.
It is because of situations like this, and his experience as a patient over many years both pre and post transplant, Ian is in support of a new regional hospital, and has signed the petition organised by The Leader to advocate for State Government funding for the project.
"A more modern hospital here would be a big bonus to me," he said.
"I know a number of my specialists have said if we had a purpose built hospital with specialty suites they would consider coming up perhaps once a month, depending on the demand for their service, to save us all having to travel into Adelaide.
"I'm not the only transplant person in the Barossa, I know of about five or six others, and there's probably more that would be able to utilise those services, and it would then mean that rather than spending a full day, you might have to go in for half an hour and still have the rest of the day to do what you want to do."
Renal dialysis and specialist outpatient services were among numerous clinical services included in the planning stages of the most recent business case for a new Barossa Hospital, as reported during a community webinar run by the Barossa and Districts Health Advisory Council Inc. in June 2022.
