Health and Community Service Industries

Telemedicine offers the potential to improve access to specialist care for people in rural communities, and for those with chronic illness, disability and limited support of carers, including in metropolitan settings. Individuals with chronic ulcers and wounds will often meet these criteria. The declining cost of equipment and impr ....

The provision of quality pharmacy services to rural and remote communities is influenced by the National Strategy for the Quality Use of Medicines. The implementation of this strategy is challenged by the shortage of pharmacists in rural areas. Australia compares unfavourably with both the UK and US in this regard. The Fourth Commu ....

Rural health is constantly experiencing the impact of persistent shortages in all clinical disciplines. This paper lists issues to consider as part of a national rural health workforce strategy in order to to generate ideas and provoke debate about priorities for rural health. Examples are provided to show how these ideas may be es ....

The blame game between the Commonwealth and the states is a feature of Australia's health system. This report suggests that an Australian Government led 'national health agenda' may address this problem. It explores and makes recommendations relating to: problems with existing funding arrangements; possible models for reform; fundi ....

People living in rural and remote Australia, and particularly Indigenous Australians, have much poorer health and inferior health services than other Australians. This presentation briefly explores the issues of an ageing rural population and its associated health demands, the incidence of depression, lack of access to health care ....

Objective: Patterns of in-hospital surgical care for lung cancer in Western Australia were examined, including the effects of demographic, locational and socioeconomic disadvantage and the possession of private health insurance, on the likelihood of receiving surgery. Patients and methods: The WA Record Linkage Project was used to ....

In 1992 the Australian Government adopted the National Mental Health Strategy in an attempt to improve the provision of mental health services. A component was to improve geographical access to hospital-based mental health services. This paper is concerned with determining if this objective has been achieved. Timeseries data on pat ....

The planning, design, funding and delivery of quality, contemporary health care is universally a complex and challenging task. This is irrespective of setting, community and population characteristics, economic circumstances and individual health status. In rural and remote Australia the complexity is magnified by unique characteristics and cha ....

The Australian Integrated Mental Health Initiative in the Northern Territory (AIMHI NT) is one site of a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Strategic Partnership initiative seeking to improve remote indigenous mental health outcomes - in a context of increasing hospital admissions and high readmission rates. Remot ....

The processes for developing the Tasmanian Rural Mental Health Plan are briefly described in this paper which also discusses some of the activities undertaken by the Barrington Support Service in progressing the mental health of students in some of Tasmania's state schools, including AusEinet project, FRIENDS in primary schools, an ....

The Federal Government's Northern Territory Emergency Response has three broad objectives: stabilisation to protect children and secure their communities; normalisation of services and infrastructures; and longer term sustainability, bringing Indigenous Australians into line with the choices other Australians enjoy. From a health p ....

Australia has a shortage of doctors in general and more so in Aboriginal communities. The 2011-2012 report by Health Workforce Australia endorses the relevance of physician assistants (PAs) in rural Australia, and this article describes the experience of a PA employed in rural Aboriginal Health Services in North Queensland. The author also shares ....

Cognitive impairment is one factor known to affect people's ability to participate in substance misuse treatment because of the range of cognitive, behavioural and emotional problems such impairment can cause. Some of the behaviours described as common features of cognitive impairment, such as impaired self-monitoring and self-regulation and lack ....

The Male Adolescent Program for Positive Sexuality (MAPPS) is an intensive group treatment program, based in Melbourne, for males 10 21 who have been found guilty of a sexual offence and placed on community based orders or custodial sentences for their behaviour. The program places emphasis on young people accepting responsibility ....