The Commonwealth Government has announced the availability of Primary Care Infrastructure Grants to enable existing general practices to expand or upgrade space for GPs, nurses or allied health professionals to improve care for patients in the community and to support training the next generation of health workers.

Three levels of funding ranging from under $150,000 to up to $500,000 are available for capital works projects that support:

• Expanding or upgrading a practice to increase the number of doctors, nurses or allied health staff;
• Expanding services to the communities, including after hours services; and
• Training of new doctors and other health professionals together in a GP Super Clinic-style facility.

Funding will be made available through an annual competitive application round for each grant stream in each of 2010 and 2011 years.

The first round of tenders close on 20th August 2010. Applications must be in the required form and satisfy the mandatory requirements.

Further information is available here.

Nicola Roxon MP Minister for Health has released a National Primary Health Care Strategy. It is the first comprehensive national policy statement for primary health care in Australia and provides the platform on which the Government plans to build the primary health care system in the future.

It comes at a time when the Australian Government is building a National Health and Hospitals Network (NHHN), which includes taking full funding and policy responsibility for primary health care services in Australia.
It is intended to provide a roadmap to guide current and future policy, planning and practice in the Australian primary health care sector.

The Strategy identifies 5 key building blocks which are considered essential system-wide underpinnings for a responsive and integrated primary health care system for the 21st century:

•    Regional integration
•    Information and technology, including eHealth
•    Skilled workforce
•    Infrastructure
•    Financing and system performance

A copy of the Strategy is available here

The Australian Government Chief Medical Officer has advised that after consideration of the results to date of a comprehensive investigation into the safety of the seasonal flu vaccine for young children, that as a precaution, the suspension of seasonal flu vaccination should continue for healthy children under five years of age.

Further information available here

The Guiding Principles of the Act safeguard the rights of people with serious mental illness, recognise and respect people as individuals in terms of their culture and background and tailoring their care and treatment (especially children and young people). The Act requires greater accountability, consistency and standardisation in all interactions. The Act provides for the provision of care, treatment and rehabilitation in the least restrictive manner and confers limited powers to make orders for involuntary treatment. It introduces into South Australia for the first time the concept of recovery.
 
The Act regulates the provision of care, treatment and rehabilitation in the least restrictive manner and confers limited powers to make orders for involuntary treatment.
The provisions of the Act include:-

•    A legislative basis for mental health reform in SA;
•    Introduce significant changes in practice to bring services in line with national and international best practice;
•    Increase accountability through the office of the Chief Psychiatrist;
•    Strengthen consumer and carer involvement to improve outcomes for consumers and families;
•    Provide high quality, safe and multidisciplinary care and treatment, and
•    Balance interventions with safeguards

SA Health has lead responsibility for comprehensively planning for the successful implementation of the new Mental Health Act 2009.  A copy of the Act, A Clinicians Guide and Code of Practice and a Plain Language Guide are available here.

The new health funding announcements in the 2010 Federal Budget have a strong focus on general practice and primary health care.

The Budget provides funding appropriations of $7.3 billion over five years to implement the commitments made by the Australian Government to the COAG National Health and Hospitals Network (NHHN) Agreement and other recent health reform related announcements such as funding for additional GP and specialist training places and alternative payments for GPs to improve the health outcomes of voluntarily enrolled diabetes patients. Around $2.2 billion over four years of this funding is earmarked for primary health care initiatives, making the 2010 Budget the most primary health care oriented Budget produced for some time.

The Budget is the culmination of the Government’s first term health reform agenda and pulls together its response to the three recent major reviews commissioned into the Australian health system:

The summary policy document, A National Health and Hospitals Network for Australia’s Future: Delivering Better Health and Better Hospitals, can be downloaded from:-

http://www.health.gov.au/internet/yourhealth/publishing.nsf/Content/report-redbook/$File/HRT_report3.pdf.

It contains a description of each measure, an overview of delivery milestones, a summary of the funding appropriations for each measure and a response to the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission final report.