Despite Prue Earle never having to travel to Melbourne during her year-long battle with cancer — which she sadly lost in March last year — her family believes her comfort would have been improved if all her care had been under one roof at GV Health.
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Prue was diagnosed with incurable and aggressive small cell lung cancer in March 2024.
By January 2025, she’d lost lost use of her legs.
“Because she couldn’t walk, they had to get the ambulance in, take her to GenesisCare (for radiation), check her in there,” her daughter Jessica Beer said.
“She had to wait and it was a lot on her, whereas having that at the hospital would be so much easier; you’d just be able to wheel patients to radiation.”
Sometimes, the ambulances were sent from Melbourne to transport patients between GV Health and GenesisCare in Shepparton.
Prue had six rounds of chemotherapy and immunotherapy at GV Health’s oncology ward, the Peter Copulos Wellness Centre, visiting for three days every three weeks between April and September 2024, before continuing with immunotherapy only.
Chemotherapy made her sick with nausea and fatigue, taking her out of action for two or three days after each round.
She lost her hair.
Then, radiation knocked her further around.
Prue’s husband, David, who volunteers every year at Shepparton’s Biggest Ever Blokes Lunch with the Rotary Club of Shepparton South, which joins forces with the three other local Rotary clubs, said he had a soft spot for the nurses who were funded by the annual cancer fundraiser.
“To see those nurses working in the ward, when they actually worked on Prue with the chemo, made it special,” he said.
“When you go there for treatment, it’s like seeing friends; you’re really comfortable. It’s just a great, happy team.
“You build a relationship with them and they were great.”
Jessica and her sister Pip Renshaw — Prue and David’s younger daughter — said when their mum got really sick and had to be rushed to hospital, the family was able to phone the oncology nurses, who would meet them in the emergency department to fill the triage nurses in on Prue’s recent history and current status.
“By having it all local, everyone knew what was going on because of the oncology team,” Jessica said.
“The communication was fantastic, we can’t fault any of it; it was so much easier than having to go to Melbourne.”
Another advantage to Prue’s treatment remaining local was that her friends could easily visit too, taking some pressure off the family to be by her side around the clock.
“So there’s the three of us here with families, but you’ve also got Mum’s two best friends, who were able to come in every second day so Dad could come home so she wasn’t on her own,” Pip said.
“And you’ve got other people popping in, whereas if you were in Melbourne, you don’t get that; you don’t have that support around you like you do when you’re here.
“I think it’s a huge thing being able to have friends pop in to brighten your day.”
After Prue was admitted to hospital early last year, she never returned home.
She spent a month in the acute ward before being moved into palliative care.
The family home, where both Pip and Jessica grew up and David still lives, is just a couple of blocks from the hospital.
It became the place where friends and family could meet, retreat and recharge in Prue’s final days.
Pip said it helped to keep the kids’ — Prue’s grandkids — lives “a little bit normal”.
“This would be the hub, we’d just rotate through the hospital and just tag team it,” she said.
“We couldn’t do that if we were in Melbourne.”
Jessica said the family was at the hospital every day.
“It takes its toll, which we were happy to do, but when you’ve got kids, work, things like that, just being able to have her friends to pop in and go, well we’re doing this time, so we could go home and have a shower,” Jessica said.
“Here, we could go home, go to work; it made it so much easier.”
The GV Health Foundation is calling on individuals, businesses and community groups to donate to its $5 million I Care for Cancer Care @ GV Health fundraising appeal to help bring first-class cancer care to the Goulburn Valley.
Donations can be made via the foundation’s website.
Community members interested in the various opportunities to contribute to and support the appeal can contact Amy De Paola via email at amy.depaola@gvhealth.org.au