In Depth: Dr Carly Roukos on life at Wandi Nerida residential treatment centre

Improvements in quality of life and reduced healthcare costs are just some of the benefits uncovered in study by Monash University into Wandi Nerida, Australia’s only non-hospital residential treatment program

The 13 bed private facility provides holistic, person-centred inpatient care on Queensland’s Gold Coast. 

“We're trying to step away from that kind of more clinical hospital feel, where everything's super sterile,” Want Nerida’s clinical lead, Dr Carly Roukos, tells us. “We try to have it feel as much not like a hospital as possible and as much like a home as we can.”

As Australia's rates of eating disorders continue to rise the need for more intensive inpatient recovery programs is also rapidly increasing. 

In this episode of Let’s Talk in Depth, she opens up with host Sam Ikin about the process of creating Wandi Nreida and what it’s like for its participants. 

“You have a dietitian and a therapist that work with you throughout the duration of your stay,” Dr Roukos says. “They meet with you a couple of times each week, and they help you kind of move through the programme and really tailor the treatment to your needs.”

But that’s just the beginning of what set’s Wandi apart. “Above and beyond that more kind of traditional therapy stuff, we offer a lot of extra more creative, expressive therapies, and a lot of it is surrounded with is sort of based in connecting with nature connecting with animals.”

Dr Roukos has been with the centre since 2020 before it had even started to take patients and has played a big in helping to guide the successful clinical program. “Anybody is welcome to apply. And that includes people from overseas, we've had some overseas participants come through, but the majority of our participants are currently from Australia.”

For more information on Wandi Nerida you can go to wandinerida.org.au.

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