The Women's has one referral pathway for women’s health specialist services, which includes gynaecology and sexual and reproductive health.
Referral criteria
We accept referrals for specialist services when the Women’s is the closest hospital with the service, based on the patient’s home address.
We also accept referrals from across Victoria for the following patient groups:
- Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander patients
- patients who are experiencing homelessness
- patients with complex needs and/or co-morbidities (determined by clinical triage upon receipt of a referral).
Statewide services
The Women's is the statewide public service for certain clinical areas:
- Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) Clinic
- Gestational Trophoblastic Disease (GTD) Registry and Clinic
- Infertility requiring Reproductive Services (Public Fertility Care)
- Menopause Symptoms After Cancer Clinic
- Perineal Clinic (<6 months postpartum)
- Sexual Health and Rapid Access Clinic
- CASA House - Violence and Sexual Assault Services.
For maternity services, please see Maternity referrals.
Guidance in assessing, managing and referring some problems can be found on HealthPathways Melbourne. The Women’s also aligns with Victoria’s Statewide Referral Criteria.
Minimum referral information
Comprehensive information is required to appropriately triage your referral, allocate women to the most suitable clinic, and identify language or support needs. Insufficient information may delay their care. The use of templates is encouraged – jump to Referral templates (Downloads).
If a woman requires urgent care, please mark your referral ‘URGENT’ and provide the reason so it can be triaged and prioritised accordingly.
Please also review information on the relevant clinic webpage to ensure your patient meets referral criteria and you include all required information. Jump to: List of women’s health specialist services.
- Full name
- Address
- Date of birth
- Phone (preferably mobile)
- Medicare number (health insurance details if no Medicare number provided)
- Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander status
- Interpreter and language required
- Support needs (e.g. mobility, disability, cultural safety, preference for clinician gender*)
- Alerts such as family violence
*We do our best to accommodate clinician gender but cannot guarantee preferences, especially where it may cause delays or compromise patient care.
- Full name
- Practice name and address
- Phone number and fax number (if appropriate)
- Email address
- Medicare provider number
- Assessment of clinical urgency (urgent or routine)
- Service(s) requested
- Presenting problem, including:
- physical examination findings, height, weight, BMI
- diagnosis/provisional diagnosis (if known)
- management and treatment
- impact on patient
- Investigations (check requirements on the relevant clinic webpage)
- Current medications
- Relevant mental health, social, genetic and family history
- Relevant medical and surgical history
Referrers are responsible for obtaining patient consent for referral and sharing sensitive, personal and health information with us. Following triage assessment, we may redirect your referral to a more suitable public health service. Please let us know if your patient does not consent to this.
In detail: How referrals are processed
Make a referral
Fax referrals to the Women's Fast Fax: (03) 8345 3036.
The use of templates is encouraged – jump to Referral templates (Downloads).
If you are a GP and do not receive a letter in 1 to 2 weeks that your referral has been accepted/declined, please contact the Access Centre (GP use only): (03) 8345 2058, option 2.
Deterioration in patient condition
It is the referrer’s responsibility to continue to monitor the patient and notify us if there is a change in the patient’s condition that could affect the urgency of treatment, or the care required.
If the patient’s condition deteriorates or changes, please re-refer them with additional information and new/more recent investigations (if applicable). Indicate this is a re-referral and mark ‘URGENT’ if relevant.
For immediate assessment and care, or after-hours support, consider the most appropriate of:
- Women’s Emergency Care or closest public emergency department
- Early Pregnancy Assessment Service (EPAS)
- phone the Women’s switchboard (03) 8345 2000 and ask to speak with the on-call gynaecology registrar
- phone Healthdirect on 1800 022 222
- Victorian Virtual Emergency Department.
List of women's health specialist services
The following services at the Women's take external referrals. Please review the relevant clinic webpage to ensure your patient meets referral criteria and you include all required information and investigations.
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Please note we do not provide cosmetic services |
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Gynaecology services |
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| Gynaeoncology services | |
| Sexual and reproductive health services |
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| Urogynaecology services |
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| Other services | |
| Services not offered |
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Related information
Downloads and Related Topics
Date reviewed: 14 March 2025
Date reviewed: 14 March 2025