The Innovative Models of Care (IMOC) program helps organisations to trial new ways of providing primary care in rural and remote communities. It also seeks to evaluate the impact on rural practice and health outcomes.
The presentation will give:
1. An overview of why innovation is required in rural and remote areas.
2. An overview of the IMOC Program including objectives and intended outcomes.
3. An overview of current IMOC trials with detailed case studies for 1 or 2 trials.
4. Evaluation findings from the Southern and Western NSW IMOC trial(s).
5. What are the critical success factors that should be in place for communities to successfully co-design and implement new innovative models of care.
More information on the program, is available on the department’s website at: https://www.health.gov.au/our-work/imoc-program

Clinical Decision Support Systems (CDSS) significantly enhance healthcare but encounter challenges in suboptimal implementation. This project focuses on a successful integration of Territory Kidney Care (TKC), a CDSS, at Wurli-Wurlinjang Health Service in the Northern Territory. This is important for Wurli's First Nations Australians, who experience a disproportionately higher burden of chronic disease, with a fivefold higher likelihood of development and a fourfold higher likelihood of CKD-related mortality.

The project's success is a valuable contribution to the broader discourse on enhancing healthcare through effective CDSS implementation. While capable of enhancing health care for clients of clinicians who use TKC, the current partial, and voluntary adoption of TKC restricts its impact. Full adoption and integration are necessary to extend these benefits across this service and should be considered by leadership intending to implement a CDSS tool.

For workforce planning in remote and rural areas it would be helpful to know what percentage of the GP workforce are likely to be leaving in the short and longer term to provide a rough guide of how many new doctors would be needed. It would also be useful to know what the main reasons are for GPs leaving as some factors may be amenable to change and some may have changed over time. A secondary analyses of survey data from 2019 and 2023, collected by Health Workforce Queensland as part of their Health Workforce Needs Assessment for QLD, was undertaken. The question asked doctors to nominate how long they intended to remain at their current location and provide the main reason(s) for their intended departure. There were 294 participants in 2019 and 338 in 2023. Approximately 10% of each cohort indicated an intention to leave in less than a year. Themed comments indicated that retirement/transition to retirement was the main reason for leaving, followed by workplace factors, personal factors and career. There were some differences between cohort groups. These results provide useful evidence for workforce planning purposes and provide support for the importance of succession planning.

Simulation-based education in psychiatry is crucial yet underdeveloped. Recognizing this gap, the University of Newcastle Department of Rural Health is piloting an interprofessional psychiatry simulation for fourth-year medicine students in rural NSW, an area where there are psychiatry workforce deficits.

The project focuses on enhancing students' theoretical and clinical learning through nurse-led simulation activities tailored to rural healthcare settings. Evaluation involves use of the Simulation Effectiveness Tool-Modified (SET-M) and qualitative feedback to investigate perceptions about simulated learning and assess students' confidence in skills. Simulation activities assist students to practice recognising nuances in patients' condition, and develop confidence in assessment, decision-making, empathy and communication. The emphasis lies not only on simulation activities, but also on the important role of debriefing and feedback. This was evaluated using the SHARP 5-step tool. Continuous evaluation will ensure ongoing improvement of learning materials.

Simulation in psychiatry fosters essential skills inherent to psychiatry practice. In addition, it diminishes stigma and provides a safe environment for learning. This project aims to advocate for the integration of simulation into psychiatry undergraduate education, particularly in rural settings.

The Australian Medical Council (AMC) is the independent national authority responsible for accreditation of medical programs. All Australian medical schools are regularly assessed against AMC standards to ensure medical graduates can meet the health needs of the Australian community. A key priority for the AMC is to develop curriculum standards that aim to protect and improve the health of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Achieving this has proved difficult with variations in the quality of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders curriculum between medical schools. Teaching cultural safety is challenging because most learning takes place outside of formal lectures and assessment in the sphere called the hidden curriculum. In January 2024 the AMC implemented new accrediting standards with a renewed focus to develop consistently high standards of Indigenous Health (IH) curriculum across all Australian medical education. This article is the first to provide an independent analysis of the new AMC standards using a novel contextual model of IH hidden curriculum.
Significant changes are identified in the new 2023 AMC Standards that suggest more clear, comprehensive and prescriptive regulation of IH curriculum in Australian medical education. Importantly, medical schools must now prioritize Indigenous partnership and stakeholder collaboration across all university activities. These landmark changes represent the beginning of an exciting period of systemic reform for IH curriculum in Australian medical education.

Queensland’s broadly dispersed population creates difficulties in providing specialist care to remote patients without significant cost. It is critical remote doctors work with patients to refer them to a specialist most appropriate for their health issue as well as in a location minimizing travel costs and time. Referring doctors can also supplement the patient’s need to travel with in-community healthcare; e.g., telemedicine consultations or support from local or visiting health services. Thus, good doctor-patient collaborations as a significant aspect of Patient-Centered Care (PCC)- may result in out-of-town specialist and in-community support choices that minimises patient’s travel-related costs while increasing their satisfaction with care.
The Patient Travel Subsidy Scheme database of Southwest Hospital and Health Services will be accessed for costs to QLD Health. Surveys and interviews will explore patient out-of-pocket travel-related expenses, level of PCC experienced from referring doctor and decision-making associated with specialist and/or in-community support choices, and satisfaction and health outcomes related to their specialist-led care. Interviews with doctors will explore doctor-patient decision-making and factors influencing specialist and/or in-community support choices.
Findings will identify potential associations between referring doctor’s level of PCC with remote patient travel costs, satisfaction with specialist-led and in-community care, and health outcomes.