Nearly 150 supporters, patients, volunteers, partners, community representatives and RFDS staff came together in Dubbo for the Royal Flying Doctor Service South Eastern Section’s annual Year in Review event.
Held at the Dubbo Visitor Experience, the event provided an opportunity to reflect on another year of healthcare delivery across rural and remote communities, while also marking 90 years of the Flying Doctor in NSW.
Our Patron, Her Excellency the Honourable Margaret Beazley AC KC, Governor of New South Wales, shared a special video message with guests, reflecting on her recent visit to Gilgandra and congratulating the RFDS community on 90 years of service in NSW.
In the 2025-26 Year in Review, Governor Beazley and Mr Dennis Wilson reflect on the growth of the Flying Doctor from its first aeromedical flight in 1936 to the comprehensive range of health services delivered today. They also highlight their visit to RFDS Medical Services in Gilgandra as an example of RFDS’s “practical commitment to providing health care in regional New South Wales.”
Greg Sam and Dr Saranne Cooke also reflected on the scale and impact of RFDS services over the past year, and the continuing need for healthcare across rural and remote communities.
Greg Sam told guests: “Everyone who works for the RFDS carries a real sense of responsibility to those communities that rely on us for vital, lifesaving aeromedical and community-based healthcare, every hour, every day.”
During 2025-26, RFDS South Eastern Section delivered 103,596 occasions of care across more than 85 rural and remote communities.
This included around 70,000 GP and nurse occasions of primary healthcare, 5,284 mental health consultations, 3,124 dental consultations, 2,613 telehealth consultations and 2,132 aeromedical primary evacuations and inter-hospital transfers. RFDS’s fleet of 14 aircraft flew more than 2.98 million kilometres during the year.
Dr Saranne Cooke told guests the figures showed not only the reach of RFDS services, but the continuing need for healthcare in rural and remote communities: “More than 100,000 occasions of care this year is a significant milestone, and a measure of service need as much as of achievement.”
A special return to Dubbo
Among those joining the event was seven-year-old Holly from Narromine, who attended with her mum Alice just months after an accident resulted in Holly needing an urgent RFDS retrieval.
On Anzac Day, 25 April 2026, Holly was seriously injured at her family’s home when a steel beam weighing more than 100kg fell across her abdomen. Although she initially appeared relatively well, scans at Dubbo Hospital revealed injuries to multiple organs and the need for specialist paediatric care in Sydney.
RFDS retrieved Holly from Dubbo to Westmead Hospital, where she spent two days in intensive care and just over a week in hospital. She is now doing well.
At the Year in Review event, guests heard Holly and Alice’s story before RFDS Flight Nurse Leanne (Annie) Wall, who was part of the crew that retrieved Holly, shared the experience from the aeromedical team’s perspective.
Annie Wall spoke about the wider team behind every RFDS retrieval, from pilots, doctors and nurses through to engineers and operations teams: “Every retrieval is the result of many people working together toward a common goal, and that is to provide the best care to people in remote Australia.”
Inside a flying emergency room
Guests also had the opportunity to step inside the RFDS Mobile Education Unit, which was fitted with aeromedical education equipment to give visitors an insight into the environment in which RFDS doctors and Flight Nurses work.
With a stretcher, medical equipment and limited room around the patient, the experience gave guests a much closer look at the skill and teamwork required to deliver complex care in the air.
It is an environment that can be difficult to appreciate until you step inside it, and helped bring to life the realities behind the thousands of aeromedical retrievals and transfers RFDS delivers each year.
90 years of RFDS in NSW
The event was also an opportunity to reflect on 90 years of continuous Flying Doctor service in NSW.
RFDS began operating from Broken Hill in 1936, established because communities across western NSW believed access to healthcare should not be determined by geography.
Ninety years later, the organisation looks very different. Emergency retrieval remains at the heart of RFDS, but its work now includes primary healthcare, GP and nurse-led clinics, dental care, mental health and alcohol and other drug services, specialist outreach, telehealth, medical chests and non-emergency patient transport.
As Greg Sam reflected: “Communities believed access to healthcare should not be determined by geography. Ninety years on, that principle still guides everything we do, even though the way we deliver on it has changed almost beyond recognition.”
And with the RFDS national centenary approaching in 2028, Dr Saranne Cooke looked ahead: “As we move towards the end of our first century, our responsibility is clear: to leave this organisation stronger, more trusted and better prepared for the future. That is the legacy we owe the next generation.”
The stories and results shared in Dubbo are captured in the 2025-26 Year in Review, highlighting the people, communities and partnerships behind more than 103,000 occasions of care over the past year.
