During the 2005 AHCRA summit, the Alliance focussed on five key areas of healthcare reform. These include:
1. Primary Care
2. Workforce
3. Rural, remote and indigenous issues
4. Citizen engagement
5. Integration of health care
Each priority area was examined in detail by a committee comprising of summitt attendees. Each committee was in turn chaired by member of the AHCRA executive at the time. Below is a brief summary of the committees' deliberations. Full papers and PowerPoint presentations from each committee are available to download at the bottom of the page.
The Primary Care committee was chaired by Professor Michael Kidd, President of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners. This committee emphasized the need for health promotion and preventative care and for a ‘wellness approach’. The main issues that emerged from this group included; the need to exploit new technologies such as e-health, that sustainability can be ensured by encouraging multidisciplinary teams and by co-locating services and that the health workforce needs to be recognized, encouraged, supported and rewarded. The special needs of people from lower socio-economic backgrounds, from indigenous communities, refugees and people seeking asylum among other groups should particularly be considered. The committee proposed that these issues could be addressed by implementing a national primary care policy, as no such policy exists to date.
The Workforce committee, chaired by Jill Iliffe the Federal Secretary of the Australian Nursing Federation prepared a response to the Productivity Commission’s position paper on Australia’s health workforce. The committee agreed in principle with the Commissions proposal to establish a health advisory workforce improvement agency. It also agreed that there is a need to integrate workforce improvement, education for the health workforce and numbers. The committee also focused on issues surrounding clinical training, accreditation and registration. The committee strongly supported establishing a review body to advise the Minister on coverage of the Medical Benefits Scheme (MBS).
The Rural, Remote and Indigenous committee was headed by Susan Stratigos, Policy Officer at the Rural Doctors Association of Australia. The committee identified the following measures to improve health outcomes:
• Better capacity building and education and training to provide further incentives and flexible training for health professionals.
• Improved support and mentoring to international health graduates in rural areas.
• National registration and mutual recognition of qualifications across the States.
The committee identified the need to maintain health infrastructure in rural areas and for populations residing in rural and remote areas have access to Medicare funded services. They noted the appalling health outcomes of the indigenous community and the need to rectify this situation.
The Communications committee was lead by Tony McBride of the Health Issues Centre. The committee identified the benefits of and proposed a model for citizen engagement as a way of involving citizens and consumers in planning for the future of Australia’s health system. Similar processes have been undertaken with success in various countries including in Canada and the UK and on a more limited scale in some parts of Australia. Faced with difficult decisions about its future, the Royal Women’s hospital in Melbourne implemented a process which involved hundreds of woman having input into planning the location and services of the hospital. Citizen engagement processes could be implemented across Australia using a variety of methods including a combination of citizens’ juries, televoting and focus group discussions. The outcomes from the engagement with the Australian community would underpin any reform to the healthcare sector. The ACA believes this is an essential first step to health reform.
The Integration Committee was chaired by Professor John Dwyer, the Chair of AHCRA. This committee proposed a National Health Care Reform Council charged with implementing agreed changes to the healthcare system. The council would include community and health professional representatives as well as government officials. The council would be the instrument to drive reforms forward.
