Flowers to QEII Jubilee Hospital in Brisbane's south

Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Hospital, known across Brisbane's southside as QEII, is a public hospital run by Metro South Health on the corner of Kessels Road and Troughton Road, Coopers Plains QLD 4108. Note the suburb: it is Coopers Plains, not Mount Gravatt, even though Mount Gravatt is a few minutes east along Kessels Road. QEII opened on 26 September 1980 and today concentrates on surgery, orthopaedics including hip and knee replacement, cardiology, endoscopy, gynaecology, urology, geriatric and respiratory medicine, with an emergency department and intensive care. Florists in Sunnybank, Salisbury and Moorooka deliver there daily.

Visiting hours at QEII

Visiting is every day between 8am and 8pm, with two visitors at a time per patient, and Metro South asks you to call ahead if you are visiting someone in intensive care. If you cannot come inside those hours the hospital may arrange another time if you let the ward know. For flowers the practical effect is simple: a florist delivering in business hours arrives well within visiting hours and hands the bouquet to the ward desk. The general number is 07 3182 6111, staffed Monday to Friday 8am to 5pm, and the operator will connect you to a ward.

What Metro South says about flowers

Metro South's own visitor guidance, which covers QEII, lists what you can bring a patient, books, magazines or fruit, and then adds that some hospitals do not allow flowers in the wards or other clinical areas, so you should check with the hospital before bringing or sending someone flowers. That sentence is the rule to follow. At QEII the wards most likely to refuse are intensive care and coronary care, and any patient with a weakened immune system; orthopaedic and general surgical wards, which make up much of the hospital, usually accept a compact arrangement. Ask the ward when you ring.

Orthopaedic patients make good recipients

Because QEII does so much hip and knee replacement, many of its patients spend several days on an orthopaedic ward and then move to rehabilitation, and they are awake, bored and glad of visitors. A bright bouquet in a container that holds its own water sits on the locker without anyone needing to find a vase, and a cheerful card with a date for a first walk outside is worth more than a large arrangement. Keep scent low in shared rooms and leave out lilies.

Parking, building works and finding the right desk

QEII is being expanded, and a new multi-level car park, P1, is about to open, after which all parking at the hospital will be paid. Pedestrian routes change as the works move, which is another reason our florists, who deliver there week in week out, are the right people to carry the bouquet rather than a courier. Give the patient's full name as admitted, the ward, and a bed number if you have one, and add your mobile so the florist can call you if the patient has been discharged or moved to another Metro South hospital such as the Princess Alexandra.

Brisbane time and the cut-off

Queensland does not have daylight saving. Order before 2pm on a weekday or 10am on a Saturday, Brisbane time, for same-day delivery Monday to Saturday; from Sydney or Melbourne in summer that means 3pm and 11am on your clock. To a hospital, same day is never guaranteed, because the ward controls when a bouquet is accepted. Bouquets start at around AUD 75 and the delivery fee is shown at checkout. If discharge is close, the home address in Sunnybank, Mount Gravatt or Coopers Plains is the better choice.

Did you know? Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Hospital was officially opened on 26 September 1980 and is run by Metro South Health.