Thank you to the clinicians, health managers, consumers and stakeholders who work with us to drive healthcare innovations across NSW.
Clinical network updates
The latest news, moves and events from our clinical networks.
The network has welcomed several new members to our Executive Committee, bringing a wealth of experience from a range of services in the sector:
- Joel Murray, Lived or Living Experience Representative
- Kevin Street, Lived or Living Experience Representative
- Alison Churchill, Chief Executive Officer, Community Restorative Centre
- Anna McVinish, Clinical Nurse Consultant, St Vincent’s Hospital
- Laila Parvaresh, Staff Specialist, South Eastern Sydney Local Health District
- Nada Andric, General Practitioner, Rev. Bill Crews Foundation
- Penny Wilkinson, Chief Executive Officer, The Overcomers Place
- Rush Electra, Consumer Engagement and Participation Manager, South Western Sydney Local Health District
Vocational Intervention Program moves to business as usual
The Vocational Intervention Program (VIP) sustainability project finishes in July 2024. The program is now business-as-usual in NSW brain injury rehabilitation services, and in partnered vocational rehabilitation providers.
The program will continue to be supported by a community of practice and a range of resources for health professionals and consumers. This includes information and toolkits for clients, employers, clinicians and vocational rehabilitation providers. The VIP toolkits promote best practice return-to-work strategies for people after a brain injury.
Farewell to Marion Fisher
The network recently farewelled Marion Fisher, our Service Support and Outcomes Manager, after 11 years with the network. Marion has been a champion of person-centred and evidence-based rehabilitation practice during her nearly 50-year career. The network wishes Marion every happiness as she spends her new free time with family and friends.
Key principles are now available to help clinicians treating critically ill children in hospital. Clinicians can use the resource Managing a high acuity child outside of a tertiary children’s hospital: Key Principles to care for children closer to home, or before they're transferred to a children's hospital with a paediatric intensive care unit.
The Taskforce continues its collaborative work to establish a network of 12 referral sites and 4 major hub services in NSW to support women experiencing severe and/or complex menopause symptoms.
New resources
- A clinical priorities brief has been published, outlining the four key clinical priorities essential for improving menopause care. Organisational models have also been identified to better manage severe and/or complex menopause in three different service delivery settings.
- Information about MenoECHO has been added to the website, which supports clinical capability building.
- An inclusive language statement has been developed to foster an inclusive environment and acknowledge that we use the words women, woman, consumers, people and patients interchangeably, alongside she/her or they/them.
Collaborative planning workshop
Congratulations to the South Eastern Sydney Local Health District (LHD) hub for leading a collaborative planning workshop on 13 June in Randwick. It was attended by district leads from Southern NSW LHD, Illawarra Shoalhaven LHD, Aboriginal Health and Community Women's Health.
Recruitment and staffing for menopause sites
Referral sites and hubs are recruiting for various clinical positions, including clinical coordinators, allied health professionals, nurses and medical staff. Keep an eye out for these opportunities on the NSW Health Careers website.
Investing in care for children with juvenile arthritis
The NSW Government has announced an investment of $6.9 million over four years to boost statewide paediatric rheumatology services. Juvenile arthritis is one of the most common chronic childhood diseases, affecting up to 10,000 children under the age of 16 in Australia.
The investment will fund an extra six senior clinicians in the multidisciplinary team at the Sydney Children’s Hospitals Network, providing faster access to highly specialised care and ongoing monitoring.
“This is such a great outcome for NSW children with juvenile arthritis, but also a great outcome for all the support work the ACI has put into this over the last four years,” says Dr Chris Needs, Musculoskeletal Network Co-chair, and Staff Specialist Rheumatology at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney Local Health District.
As a result of the funding, in 2024/25 the network will update the paediatric rheumatology model of care to incorporate recent evidence, embed virtual care, and formalise a statewide networked approach and transition program. It will consider alternative models of care, including virtual care innovations, advanced and extended practitioner workforce models, stronger multidisciplinary workforce access, and collaboration with primary care.
The network acknowledges the Advisory Group who provided expert advice on juvenile arthritis to achieve this outcome, including clinical subject matter experts and Ministry of Health representatives. Thanks also to colleagues from the Paediatric and Transition Care networks and the Virtual Care and Evidence teams, and special acknowledgement to clinical experts Jeff Chaitow, Davinder Singh-Grewal, Anne Senner and Debra Grech, who have been champions for their patients for decades.
As part of the Future Health plan, the network is reviewing uptake and use of the Key principles for transition care across the health system. Clinicians, health staff and managers from adult and paediatric health settings are invited to share insights and feedback. The review will help the network understand awareness and use of the key principles; develop resources to embed them into clinical practice; and share local examples of transition care.
You can participate by:
- Completing the online QARS survey
- Joining a virtual focus group session being held in July and August.
- Contacting out network manager, Rachael Havrlant, to organise a discussion.
Please also share this opportunity with your colleagues, including those who regularly support young people transitioning to adult health services, and those who may not.
Statewide program updates
News and events from our Virtual Care and Patient Reported Measures teams.
Toolkit to support virtual end of life and palliative care
A toolkit of resources is now available to support clinicians to provide accessible, high-quality end of life and palliative care, virtually. Practical information and considerations on providing virtual care now accompany each of the nine key actions in the Clinical Principles for End of Life and Palliative Care Guideline. This can be used in conjunction with a new consolidated list of Virtual care palliative care resources for clinicians, patients and families, and the recently published Virtual care in practice guide.
The Guideline supports the End of Life and Palliative Care Framework, and identifies the clinical principles and key actions that will support quality, evidence-informed practice and improvement in the provision of end of life and palliative care in NSW.
The toolkit was developed in collaboration with the Health Education and Training Institute (HETI), and end of life and palliative care clinicians.
End of life and palliative care videos translated for diverse audiences
New translated versions of an animated video will empower people to seek virtual palliative care for themselves or a family member. The video is available in English, Arabic, Auslan, Chinese, Hindi, Kurdish and Vietnamese.
The animation helps clinicians bridge language barriers and make virtual care accessible to more people with advanced illnesses, their families and caregivers. Please share these valuable resources with patients and their support networks, and find more virtual care resources for patients and clinicians.
Remote patient monitoring guide
Our new digital guide about remote patient monitoring supports clinicians and health services to set up and deliver remote patient monitoring (RPM) services in NSW. RPM is a way to deliver virtual care that uses digital health technologies for the remote collection, transmission and analysis of a patient's health data.
The guide provides an overview of how RPM can be integrated into existing clinical services, service model categories and core components of an RPM service, along with key sections about:
- the patient journey: guides clinicians on key aspects to consider throughout the RPM patient journey from onboarding to monitoring, escalation and offboarding
- technology: covers the considerations influencing monitoring methods and device selection, equipment logistics and contingency plans for technology downtime
- cohort-specific information: additional guidance outlining care for specific patient cohorts (type 2 diabetes, heart failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), including RPM best practice and sample care pathways.
Thank you to the many clinicians and virtual care experts who contributed their expertise to the development of the guide.
Improving engagement with Aboriginal patients
Congratulations to the Western NSW LHD Patient Reported Measures (PRMs) team, who have led improvements in the uptake of PRMs among Aboriginal communities.
After identifying that lower numbers of PRMs were being collected from Aboriginal patients, the team took a tailored approach. The PRM leads partnered with local Aboriginal health workers and practitioners and yarned about what was and wasn't working. The yarning recognised the need for a population approach to implementing PRMs, rather than the usual cohort or condition-specific approach. This included:
- giving access to the PRMs program for all people using Aboriginal health services, regardless of their condition
- delivering whole-of-workforce training, collaboratively and in-person
- collaborating on a resource to increase cultural relevance and local applicability to assist with applying the Patient Reported Outcome Measures Information System (PROMIS-29) questionnaire.
Since these changes were made, an additional 34 Aboriginal health practitioners and health workers are collecting PRMs across the district. The results are impressive with more than 300 PROMIS-29 surveys completed, which is an increase of more than 900%.
Share the new consumer video explaining patient-reported measures
A new animated video explaining the PRMs program is available for clinicians to share with patients, carers and their families. It’s available in the six most common languages used in NSW: English, Arabic, Cantonese, Greek, Mandarin and Vietnamese. The videos are also available in the Health Outcome Patient Experience (HOPE) Platform.
The aim is to distribute the videos across all health settings using PRMs at the point of care to share with consumers. This includes inpatient and outpatient hospital settings, community settings and primary care. If you need help to share, promote or use the videos, please email: aci-prm@health.nsw.gov.au
Thanks to the multicultural community consumer groups and local health district and specialty health network PRM program leads who contributed to this project.
Join the PRMs Community of Interest
The PRMs Community of Interest (COI) provides a forum to network, collaborate and build understanding of the value of PRMs. The quarterly forum includes presentations and opportunity for discussion.
Register now for the next PRMs COI meeting on 18 September, 11am-12pm, which will include:
- insights from Illawarra Shoalhaven LHD’s Aunty Jean’s Service into their implementation of PRMs and the impact of collecting and using PRMs at an individual and service level
- a jurisdictional PRMs program presentation.
For more information, contact your local PRM Lead or email ACI-PRM@health.nsw.gov.au