SSWAHS = SWSLHD + SLHD and the Medicare Locals - 66

THE following message is from the CEO of the SSW-GP-Link and posted on their website

http://www.macdivgp.com.au/site/index.cfm?display=288436

In this statement the CEO says:
"Our start date will be 1st July 2012 which leaves us just over 7 months to implement our plans and listen to the members and community we serve." 

One is driven to ask the obvious question - "Why didn't you do this before making the collective public of the South West Sydney captive to your plans, Mr Pennock! Now the public must listen to your plans as hatched by your Division and that of the Southern Highlands Division of General Practice!"

What can be suggested is, perhaps, the dis-enfranchised mass of health consumers, private and public healthcare providers, and the managers of the non-government health service sector should take up Mr Pennock's offer and use the  Contact Us  link to make your voice heard; ask the hard question; or ask the question what are you planning to provide to us in the Wollondilly and Wingecarribee Shires?

Perhaps you would like to start by looking at the scope of the SSW Medicare Local through the Department of Health and Ageing website: www.yourhealth.gov.au

 

Medicare Local Information

"Sydney South West GP Link in partnership with our colleagues Southern Highlands Division of General Practice, is very proud to confirm that on the 4th November 2011 the Hon Nicola Roxon MP, Minister for Health and Ageing, announced that we were successful in our application to form the South Western Sydney Medicare Local (SWSML). We will be one of 62 new Medicare Locals across the Nation implementing the new Primary Health Care Reform.

"Our start date will be 1st July 2012 which leaves us just over 7 months to implement our plans and listen to the members and community we serve. We are also extremely fortunate that South Western Sydney will have one Medicare Local and one Local Health District. This alone is a significant step towards improving integration between primary health care and the hospital system.

"As this link becomes more populated over the next few months please click on Contact Us for any questions or issues you wish to raise. I strongly encourage anyone to provide us with any feedback as we move towards our start date on 1st July 2012."

Rene Pennock
Chief Executive Officer

The boundaries of each Medicare Local can be viewed at www.yourhealth.gov.au

Medicare Locals to Commence from July 2012

Medicare Local	Applicant	State/Territory
Central Coast NSW	Central Coast Division of General Practice	NSW
Eastern Sydney	South Eastern Sydney Division of General Practice	NSW
Far West NSW	NSW Outback Division of General Practice	NSW
Inner West Sydney	Central Sydney GP Network	NSW
South Eastern Sydney	Sutherland Division of General Practice	NSW
Southern NSW	Southern GP Network	NSW
South Western Sydney	Sydney South West GP Link and Southern Highlands Division of General Practice	NSW
Eastern Melbourne	Eastern Ranges GP Association	Victoria
Gippsland	East Gippsland Primary Health Alliance, Central West Gippsland Division of General Practice, and General Practice Alliance South Gippsland	Victoria
Goulburn Valley	Goulburn Valley Division of General Practice	Victoria
Grampians	West Vic Division of General Practice	Victoria
Hume	Albury-Wodonga Regional GP Network	Victoria
Central Queensland	CQ Medicare Local	Queensland
Far North Queensland	Far North Queensland Rural Division of General Practice	Queensland
Sunshine Coast	Sunshine Coast Division of General Practice	Queensland
Wide Bay	GP Links Wide Bay	Queensland
Country South SA	Murray Mallee General Practice Network	South Australia
Bentley-Armadale	Canning Division of General Practice	Western Australia
Perth Central and East Metro	Perth Primary Care Network	Western Australia
Northern Territory	General Practice Network NT, Aboriginal Medical Services Alliance NT and NT Government Department of Health	Northern Territory

SSWAHS = SWSLHD + SLHD and the Medicare Locals - 64

Medicare Locals - Criteria for applicants

Given the apparent failure (again) of the Macarthur - Southern Highlands consortium to gain selection in the second tranche of the successful Medicare Locals announced this week, it is perhaps timely to reproduce here the DoHA selection criteria which the consortium needs to consider for the third tranche to be notified. I suggest to the Boards of the SWSGP Link and the SHDGP that they should consider in particular Criterion 2; and Criterion 4 - 6. 

At present, there are clearly significant gaps in the consultation process with key stakeholders and groups that the consortium has been required to have in the development phase of their application. Perhaps they should take a serious look at the way in which the Bankstown GP Division progressed their community consultation process

The relevant consortium Boards need to beat their collective breasts and admit their failure and then, start again!

2.4 Selection Criteria

There are six (6) selection criteria against which applications for Medicare Local funding will be assessed. These criteria are outlined below:

Criterion 1:

Demonstrated expertise and capacity to address the five Strategic Objectives for Medicare Locals specified above, for the selected catchment area including outlining:

i. Activities currently undertaken and previous achievements which relate to each of the five strategic objectives;

ii. How these activities can be extended and expanded to meet the needs of a modern primary health care system;

iii. Demonstrated knowledge of the population base, health service architecture and infrastructure, utilisation and other demographic characteristics and health priorities in the proposed catchment area (this should indicate the evidence from which this knowledge is drawn);

iv. A strategy for development of a population and health service plan to address need;

v. Infrastructure already in place;

vi. Capacity to collect and manage data as appropriate;

vii. Strategies for ensuring appropriate accountability and transparency to the community; and

viii. Indicative personnel and other resources to be allocated to deliver these activities.

AND

Criterion 2:

Proposed governance and operational arrangements, including:

i. Details of the proposed legal/corporate and organisational structures;

ii. Experience and skills expertise of the proposed Executive;

iii. A structure that recognises the diversity of clinicians, services and health care recipients within the modern primary health care sector;

iv. Structures that encourage and maintain local engagement and responsiveness;

v. A transition plan, including estimates of costs associated with transition activities;

vi. Strategy for ensuring appropriate clinical governance;

vii. Strategy, skills and expertise to manage flexible funding to target services to the local community’s specific needs;

viii. Strategy for establishing effective linkages with other sectors and organisations, including Local Hospital Networks; and

ix. Strategy for ensuring community engagement and accountability.

The assessment panel will have regard for the desired governance attributes, including broad community and health professional representation, as well as business management expertise; and strong clinical leadership.

AND

Criterion 3:

The financial viability of the Medicare Local including:

i. Demonstrated record in efficient and effective use of funds of each organisation covered by the proposal;

ii. The experience and expertise of the organisation’s proposed executive team to manage substantial public funds appropriately; and

iii. Current contractual arrangements.

AND

Criterion 4:

Demonstrated evidence of ability to engage with and form productive relationships with key stakeholders, providing supporting evidence of any current partnerships and operational arrangements, and strategies to improve engagement with:

i. Community Organisations;

ii. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Organisations;

iii. Workforce Organisations;

iv. General practice;

v. The broader primary health care sector; and

vi. Research Organisations.

AND

Criterion 5:

Strategies and ability to respond to local needs and emerging priorities, including Commonwealth priorities in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health, eHealth and telehealth, mental primary health care, aged care, population health and after hours primary health care.

AND

Criterion 6:

Evidence of ability to build upon a sustained track record of high performance as a Division/s of General Practice or primary health care related organisation, including:

i. Driving improved outcomes and system change in general practice and primary health care through effective practice support;

ii. Improving eHealth and information management infrastructure, including the use of data to improve preventive health and chronic disease management in clinical practice, to measure the effectiveness of health program delivery, and to inform population–based services planning and evaluation;

iii. Effective governance and corporate management;

iv. Demonstrating effective collaborative relationships with other agencies and health service providers to achieved improved referral pathways, health service provision and/ or outcomes, including a demonstrated culture of inclusion across the spectrum of primary health care service provision and local community engagement;

v. Demonstrating compliance with contractual obligations;

vi. Delivering sustained achievement and improvement against national performance indicators for Divisions of General Practice (where relevant) and associated programs; and

vii. Actively sharing expertise and resources with others to promote quality improvement and knowledge transfer across the primary health care sector.

The selection panel will develop a relative merit list from the applications assessed, based on the selection criteria above, and provide recommendations of preferred applicants to the Minister for Health and Ageing.

The selection panel will also have regard to the desirability of achieving a reasonable spread of Medicare Locals across the country and geographic classifications for the first tranche of Medicare Locals.

All applicants should note that, where the assessment process does not identify a preferred applicant within a Medicare Local region, the Department reserves the right to broker an arrangement between funding applicants and/or other interested parties.

SWSLHD and Bowral's Health - 35

Four fixes needed for PCEHR

• By Michael Woodhead on  20 October 2011 - 6Minutes

The success of the PCEHR is threatened by the lack of GP input into the program and lack of a Medicare rebate to recognise the extra workload it will create for GPs, the RACGP says.

In a statement released this week,  the College says  the lack of clinical input into the design and implementation of an electronic record system was one of the key reasons for the demise of the UK’s e-health program.

It says the Department of Health and Ageing, NEHTA and the RACGP need to reach agreement on critical issues “such as data quality and ownership within the PCEHR, the PCEHR’s links with clinical software, and possible impact on clinical and practice workflows which will be a disincentive to widespread adoption. “

RACGP president Professor Claire Jackson says the College is also concerned about the lack of any incentives  for general practice for additional tasks such as creating PCEHR documents and obtaining informed consent.

The College has also highlighted two other critical areas of the PCEHR that need attention, citing the need to get patient s from high risk groups to “opt in” and the clinical and medicolegal risks of allowing  patients to alter their clinical record.

A program is needed to encourage PCEHR uptake by the groups that will most likely to benefit, namely patients with chronic and complex conditions, older Australians, Aboriginal people and mothers with new-born children, it says.

GP Super Clinics - Is there ever anything for nothing - 8 ?!

Super clinic collapse warning went unheeded

17th Oct 2011 Byron Kaye   all articles by this author

HEALTH Minister Nicola Roxon’s office was warned 14 months ago that the Sorell GP super clinic would collapse without extra funding but promised to “make a priority of sorting this immediately post election”, MO can reveal.

But rather than give a $1.5 million lifeline as requested by its operators, the Department of Health and Ageing asked the clinic owner after the 2010 election to cut costs by substituting curtains for walls between doctors’ rooms, lowering the entire building, and relying on “natural ventilation” instead of toilet exhaust systems.

Edward Gauden, CEO of Sorell Integrated Healthcare (SIH), which was to operate the Sorrel super clinic, refused these requests but, encouraged by Ms Roxon’s office, was holding out for other commonwealth funding when he learned on the evening news this month that the minister had scrapped the project.

Emails between the offices of Ms Roxon and local Labor MP Dick Adams, the department and Mr Gauden, obtained by MO, confirm Mr Gauden’s claims that he had long warned the government that the super clinic – which had support among local doctors – could not be built for the allotted $2.5 million, and that he was repeatedly assured the government would step in to save it.

On 12 August 2010, with the federal election less than two weeks away, Mr Adams’s electorate officer Dee Alty wrote to the minister warning that if a funding solution could not be found that same day, SIH would be “announcing publicly tomorrow that they will not be going ahead as they do not have the funding… It is just insufficient”.

The email also questioned “why the Sorell super clinic is not being seen as a proper super clinic which should like the others attract the $5 million”.

Ms Roxon’s chief of staff Angela Pratt responded that the government was in caretaker mode and could not commit new money, but advised that Mr Adams “should say [to Mr Gauden] that he has spoken to the minister’s office and been given an assurance that we will look at the issue post election if Labor is returned, to get the clinic back on track”.

Ms Alty pressed further, writing the next day that Mr Gauden needed assurance the building would be finished by the end of 2010. Ms Pratt replied: “We will make a priority of sorting this immediately post election… Obviously we don’t want it to fall over either!”

Ms Roxon announced on 7 October 2011 the clinic would not go ahead. Three days later the government committed another $3.2 million to the troubled Redcliffe super clinic in Queensland, on top of an existing $10 million outlay. A spokesperson for Ms Roxon said the department met with SIH “on numerous occasions to assist them in reworking their proposal but unfortunately we have recently been made aware that they will not proceed on this original basis”.

Mr Adams said his office had pressed for more funds, but Mr Gauden should have been able to build the clinic for $2.5 million.

Tags: Sorell; Super Clinics; Roxon; DOHA

Comments

DrPhil
18th Oct 2011
3:27pm

curtains not walls between consulting rooms???? is this 1948 or what????

Limmie
18th Oct 2011
4:08pm

I wonder if Roxon will be happy to see her doctor if the doctor were consulting in a space that is partitioned off with a curtain rather than sound dampened or sound proof walls? How ridiculous is this Minister? I bet, if MO asked her directly, she will vow that she was not aware of the machinations going on with the SIH. Once again, we see evidence that decisions about superclinics have been political rather than business-based. The waste of tax payers money by this Labor government is the same as the days of Whitlam's largess. This spend-a-thon has to stop. As taxpayers, we are not getting value for money.
I don't know the medical manpower supply for Sorell nor whether there is indeed a need for same. It seems the support of local GPs made no difference to the decisions made by the Minister. I wonder, if the local GPs were vociferous in condemning the superclinic, the Minister might consider the request for further funds for the SIH as worthy of supporting. Hasn't that been the pattern of her behaviour. Anything she can do to get stuck into medical practitioners, she will do. Add this to the insult to the Medicare rebate for non-VR doctors now becoming lower than that of "Noctors", can we call this style of governance fair and equitable?

SSWAHS = SWSLHN + SLHN and the Medicare Locals - 40

Mr Stephen Jones MP
PO Box 6022
House of Representatives
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600
 
Tel: (02) 6277 4661
Fax: (02) 6277 8548  

27 April 2011

Dear Mr Stephen Jones MP,

Medicare Local Submissions - April 5, 2011

I am aware that there were two applications by organisations bidding for the funding allocated for the SWS Medicare Local which was to include the Southern Highlands of NSW. It is my understanding that the Bankstown GP Division (SWS Health Coalition) has done so, and the Macarthur-Southern Highlands Divisions of General Practice have also submitted their application.

I am also aware that the intent of DoHA was that there should be extensive consultation with the local communities, local health practitioners in both the public and private health services, and the non-government organisations who provide health and welfare services to the residents of the Southern Highlands.

It is my understanding that the Macarthur-Southern Highlands Division’s application proposed that the current Southern Highlands Division would be a discrete part of the enhanced Macarthur Division of General Practice, who would have responsibility for the area between Fairfield- Bankstown and Bowral. I say it is my understanding simply because there has been no public discussion with the local Southern Highlands- Wollondilly communities, with the private health practitioners or with the NGOs by the Southern Highland Divisions of General Practice or, apparently, by the Macarthur Division of General Practice.

There have been no public meetings, nothing in the local press about the transition to Medicare Locals, and the only discussion by the CEO of the Southern Highlands Division of General Practice with a few members of the local private psychologist practitioners was to talk to them about introducing the ARGUS electronic communication system to their practices. The only discussion the CEO of the Southern Highlands Division of General Practice has been to inform some of the heads of Departments of the Bowral Hospital and Community Health Services that the funding of the current Division will end in July 2012 and that the liaison with the Macarthur Division was their Board’s proposed option. This does not amount to any form of robust discussion and involvement by the local community in how the Medicare Local would help the people of the Southern Highlands.

The contrast between the Macarthur-Southern Highlands Division’s lack of involvement with the local community and its health care providers, and the community-involvement actions seen in the Bankstown GP Division’s-SWS Health Coalition’s process for developing its application is extreme.

Yet when confronted with that significant difference the CEO of the Southern Highlands Division states that the assertion is “wrong” and “offensive” to say that there has been no community consultation. However, even a cursory examination of the Southern Highlands Division’s Newsletter (The Highlands Doctor) to its members shows that it has not been updated since July 2010. It would, therefore, seem that even its member GPs have not been kept informed as to what their Board has been negotiating with the Macarthur Division of General Practice.

The purpose of this letter, therefore, is to let you, and DoHA, know that the application by the Macarthur-Southern Highlands Divisions of General Practice is questionable in that:

1.       There does not appear to have been any significant community consultations with the people and health care providers in the Southern Highlands.

2.       There has been a veil of secrecy from the Southern Highlands Division of General Practice and the Macarthur Division in regard to what their planned intentions are in respect of how they would operate as a Federally-funded Medicare Local.

3.       There have been no public presentations to the community in the Southern Highlands and, possibly, in the Macarthur – Wollondilly jurisdictions to encourage community involvement and collaboration in the development of the Medicare Local proposed for the South West Sydney area.

4.       There has been no explanation to the local community as to how the Medicare Local would purchase the health services that would improve their health needs, in contrast to the existing available Medicare-funded health services in both the public and private sectors.

5.       There has been no indication that the general practitioners are aware of what their relevant Boards have proposed for the changed delivery of health services and how those changes will affect the viability of the whole health practitioner’s network.

6.       The AMA organisations in states and nationally appear to be gaining feedback from their members that the majority of GPs are unable to describe what the proposed Medicare Locals will do for their community members, or are opposed to the concept altogether. Since the outcome for Medicare Locals is dependent upon the GPs as well as other health professionals in the private sector one has to wonder if funded Medicare Locals will in fact obtain local support.

7.       It is questionable that, if the current Divisions of General Practice have difficulty in establishing transparent governance of their actions, how those same Boards will manage to introduce the transparent governance to the new Medicare Locals.

Yours sincerely,

A local resident.

SWSLHN + SLHN = SSWAHS : Tobacco marketing and use

Smoking out The Australian

April 14, 2011 – 11:56 am, by Melissa Sweet

The Australian newspaper has recently run a series of articles attacking the Federal Government’s cigarette packaging reforms, including one quoting Nobel Laureate Professor Barry Marshall’s reservations about the measures.

Dr Ross MacKenzie, Lecturer in Health Studies at Macquarie University, says we shouldn’t lose sight of the evidence suggesting the packaging will prove to be a major boost for public health.

***

What’s smoking at The Australian?

Ross MacKenzie writes:

Editors at The Australian have made clear their opposition to the Federal Government’s proposals to legislate plain cigarette packaging that incorporates graphic health warnings.

The paper’s Friday 8 April editorial Smokescreen or deterrent? argues that smoking rates have been dropping for decades without this “latest proposal for even more hideous cigarette packaging”, managing to imply that tobacco control legislation enacted to date has played no part in this trend.

The editorial states that cigarette manufacturers should be allowed to present their brands to consumers in much the same way that other legal products are packaged, and suggests that significant price hikes may well deter more smokers than would the proposed packaging regulation. That the government’s 2009 tax increase on alcopops is dismissed in the same piece as a “cynical revenue-grab” is apparently not contradictory.

In The Weekend Australian (In the care of a nanny state, Saturday 9 April 2011), the paper’s legal affairs editor Chris Merrit reveals no such inconsistencies. Plain cigarette packaging is nothing less than a demonstration of the growth of the nanny state in Australia, and an example of social engineering.

Merritt has called on representatives of the Centre for Independent Studies and the Institute of Public Affairs to support his analysis, although he fails to mention that both of these free-market think tanks have consistently opposed tobacco control initiatives, have received funding from the tobacco industry, or that the Institute of Public Affairs has had tobacco industry executives on its board, as described in ASH Australia’s 2010 report Countering Tobacco Tactics.

Given the apparent difficulties in establishing a logical and objective opposition to the proposed legislation, The Australian’s editors must have been delighted to be able to publish the opinions of Dr Barry Marshall on this issue. (Roxon’s gone too far, says Nobel winner. The Australian 11/4/2011). In the report, Marshall is quoted as stating that as it’s not illegal to smoke there needs to be a limit to tobacco control legislation, and that such regulation persecutes smokers.

Dr Marshall’s credentials and contributions to public health are unimpeachable – Nobel laureates are few and far between, after all.

But what the article reports are Marshall’s personal beliefs, not a scientific evaluation of the legislative proposal or its potential impacts. Certainly, many people will find some of the graphic health warnings sickening and extreme, as he describes them, but this is their very point – to remind smokers that the potentially extreme consequences of smoking include numerous types of cancers and other chronic illnesses.

There is a compelling body of research that points to the effectiveness of such warnings on cigarette packs but as no country as yet requires plain packaging, related research on its specific impact has been necessarily experimental.

Perhaps the most revealing indication that plain packs featuring graphic health warnings will indeed prove to be a successful public health measure is that the tobacco industry in Australia has spent millions of dollars fighting the initiative since it was first announced in 2010.

***

PS from Croakey: Readers wanting more background on the rationale for the packaging measures should have a look at the Preventative Health Taskforce’s work in this area.

One Comment

1. Alex H
   Posted April 14, 2011 at 1:43 pm
   

   It boils down to the last paragraph. If it won’t reduce tobacco sales, why would big tobacco fight it so vigorously?

   Companies use brands products to sell more product, I would imagine that any unbiased marketer worth their salt would tell you that removing brands will impact on sales.

   Less sales = less tobacco smoked = public health benefit = successful policy outcome.