For the past three years nine-year-old Angus Wood has been on a waiting list to see a cardiac specialist at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne.
This week he has finally been able to get an appointment closer to home at Bendigo Hospital, where the Royal Children's Hospital is offering a satellite cardiac clinic.
The clinic is staffed by children's cardiac specialists from Melbourne visit the hospital, bringing with them equipment, like ultra-sound machines, designed for kids like Alex.
"He had an echo at birth," his mum, Belinda Wood, said.
"I knew everything was OK — it wasn't urgent, but it was still a long time to be waiting."
Off the list
Fourteen children from across the Loddon Mallee region and southern New South Wales have already been moved off waiting lists and seen by specialists this week.
That has saved their families a return trip to Melbourne, which can often take more than six hours.
"Some parents are doing it tough and they've got complex health problems," paediatric cardiologist Jacob Mathew said.
"So it's a lot more manageable for them not to have to travel."
The specialists are treating a range of issues in the children.
"It can be anything as simple as a murmur that just gets checked out, or it can be something a whole lot more complicated that requires a lot of treatment," Dr Mathew said.
"There are things you can be born with, like congenital heart disease, and kids develop rhythm troubles [and] some other unusual problems that are specific to childhood."
'Completely different'
Bendigo's head of cardiology, Voltaire Nadurata, said regional children deserved the same level of access to care as adults.
"If someone who is 80 years old can get their service, why not a f-year-old kid or two-year-old baby?" he said.
In the past, treating children with heart issues has presented challenges for Bendigo Health medical experts.
"It's a completely different field, completely different way of management," Dr Nadurata said.
"We're not really trained or that expert in looking after children, from simple diagnostic studies to ECG, let alone ultrasound."
The service will be available at least once every three months, but if demand increases specialists could travel to the region more often.
"They're our future," Dr Nadurata said.
