Advancing
person-centred care

We progress healthcare innovations that put people at the centre of their care and reflect diverse individual, community and cultural needs.

Co-designing mental healthcare with, and for, LGBTIQ+ people

Watch a short video introducing the Rainbow Resource

We launched the Rainbow Resource in February – an online toolkit for child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) and other clinicians supporting LGBTIQ+ young people and their families.

It was developed by our Mental Health Network, and co-designed with CAMHS clinicians, community advocates, the ACI Aboriginal Health and Wellbeing team and young people with lived experience.

The toolkit is supporting mental health clinicians to:

understand LGBTIQ+ communities, identity and experience
support LGBTIQ+ young people, parents and carers
foster an inclusive and effective therapeutic environment.

NSW Health Secretary Susan Pearce (left) with consumers who shared their experiences

Using patient-reported measures to improve health and wellbeing

Consumers like Ray explain how their care is enhanced by the opportunity to provide feedback through patient-reported measures (PRMs) surveys. This helps their care team understand what matters most to them, beyond clinical symptoms, to provide more personalised care.

Explore all of our consumer stories, including the voices of 4 Aboriginal people who explain how PRMs can support culturally safe care and amplify Aboriginal voices in health service design and delivery.

Informing care to meet patients' needs

The PRMs team celebrate 200,000 patient- reported measure surveys.

More than 200,000 patient-reported measures (PRMs) surveys have now been submitted within NSW health services, helping to shape a better, more responsive healthcare system. This means, the voices of 75,000+ patients have been heard, as they share feedback about their health experiences and outcomes.

Since February 2024, the number of surveys collected has doubled, using the digital Health Outcomes and Patient Experience (HOPE) platform, delivered with eHealth NSW.
This is driven by expansion into clinical areas such as burns, menopause, maternity, paediatric and general rehabilitation.
A short video explaining PRMs is helping patients and carers from diverse backgrounds to understand PRMs, and is now available in 11 languages.

1,680

NSW health services are now offering PRMs surveys to patients

4,000

clinicians are using the HOPE platform

Elevating the consumer voice

More consumers joined our advisory groups, executive committees and forums this year. They are contributing their lived experience and voices to policy development, resource production and service redesign across our networks and projects.

The Intellectual Disability Network’s Carers’ Advisory Group influenced major state and national policies.
Young people and their parents got involved in our Transition Care Network’s Aboriginal Transition Experiences Project; and the network’s new consumer advisory group launched with 9 members.
Our Rural Health Network formed a consumer advisory group to inform the development of a new resource; a 75-member rural consumer and carers subgroup formed to guide the network’s consumer engagement; and an Aboriginal rural consumer was appointed to the network’s executive committee.

Alice, new member of the Rural Health Network Executive Committee.

Learning from lived experience

We continue to seek the insights and perspectives of consumers with lived experiences throughout key events aimed at fostering innovation and improvement in clinical care.

At the Stroke Network Forum, we heard from stroke survivors and advocates who shared their lived experience. The Dunghutti Stroke Group also shared their work to reimagine the FAST stroke message (Face, Arms, Speech, Time) for Aboriginal communities – a powerful example of a community-led stroke care initiative.

Ahead of Dementia Action Week, our Aged Health Network partnered with Dementia Australia for an interactive event for NSW Health staff that offered everything from powerful lived-experience stories to hands-on virtual reality and AI tools. People living with dementia and their carers shared their experiences, inspiring us to identify ways the healthcare system can better support them.

Our State Spinal Cord Injury Service hosted a webinar with Spinal Cord Injuries Australia to mark the International Day of People with Disability. Presenters included people with lived experience who shared valuable insights, and strategies on how employers can foster a more inclusive workplace culture for people with disabilities.

Advancingperson-centred care