Goulburn Base Hospital is a public district hospital located in the city of Goulburn, New South Wales in Australia. The hospital is situated on Goldsmith Street, approximately from the Central Business District. The hospital is operated by Southern NSW Local Health District and serves as a regional referral facility providing a range of general, surgical and some specialist services. It is a teaching hospital affiliated with the Australian National University, based in Canberra. Services An 9 bed emergency department operates 24 hours. Goulburn Base Hospital has a 6 bed Intensive Care Unit for adult patients, specializing in high dependency and coronary care. Critical patients who are suffering from conditions the hospital is not equipped to handle are transferred to Canberra or Sydney. A helipad on the hospital grounds facilitates patient transfers and evacuations. A 20 bed rehabilitation ward was opened in 2013. The Chisholm Ross Centre is a 32 bed inpatient psychiatric unit for patients suffering acute mental health conditions. Other specialist services provided include gastroenterology, ophthalmology a renal unit and a maternity ward. A variety of allied health services are also available on the hospital campus. History Origin of the name In worldwide usage, a base hospital is a military hospital located a safe distance from the battlefront to which patients from field hospitals are evacuated for follow up care. After World War I, the term was applied in Australia and New Zealand to large rural hospitals, which, by analogy, performed a similar function of providing specialist or follow up care for patients from smaller hospitals. For instance, in 1923, the NSW Minister for Public Health, Mr. Oakes, while speaking at Goulburn District Hospital, specifically proposed the establishment of rural base hospitals: "There should be large and properly equipped base hospitals in the important centres and cottage hospitals scattered through out the various country districts connecting with the larger institutions when necessary by motor service brigades." In the following year, at the launching of a building fund for the hospital, reference was made to the need to provide adequate local funds to attract Government support (50% funding) for establishing a base hospital in Goulburn. The first base hospital established in NSW was Orange Base Hospital in November 1933. However, a number of subsequent attempts to seek funding to bring Goulburn District Hospital up to base hospital standard were unsuccessful. It wasn't until 1940 that Goulburn Hospital was publicly referred