The following extract the booklet ‘Pioneering in the Bellinger Valley’ emphasises the importance of the maternity unit at the Hospital to the shire community:

“Bellingen became front page news in the newspapers of N.S.W., Australia and the world on 17th August, 1950 when the first of the famous Sara Quads was born; and the later births were dramatized world-wide.

Drs Hewitt, Elliott and Elphinstone, of Bellingen, and Dr Ostinga, an obstetric consultant from Newcastle, who flew up in the first morning light of the 17th August, were all active in the historic event: the birth of the first quads born and surviving in Australia. All treatment and the care of the children and mother was carried out at the Bellinger River District Hospital.”