Refugee Health clinical hub
A model for integrated clinical care using the National Broadband Network
Refugees arriving in Australia often have complex health conditions that require medical care from both General Practitioners and specialist practitioners multiple times over the course of their treatment. Approximately 3,500 humanitarian refugees arrive in Victoria annually, with half aged 19 years or younger with many having several health issues.
The demand on healthcare providers to deliver care often results in patients seeing numerous hospital doctors, and with unwieldy paper-based medical records, results are hard to find and progress difficult to track. Additionally, interactions between GPs and hospital specialists, and language barriers and access to interpreters compound the problems of providing patient care.
This project is creating a path of efficient communication between hospital specialists and primary care providers by developing a web-based Clinical Hub that is secure, sustainable and supported by clinical stakeholders across the sector. The Clinical Hub will provide access to specialist care summaries from the four Victorian Immigrant/Refugee health clinics, generate primary health care plans with two GP practices and enable high-resolution, low latency videoconferencing for case conferences, tele-interpreting and to deliver real-time telehealth specialist support for GPs in regional areas.
High-speed broadband networks provide a platform for GP and specialist collaboration for optimal patient care across a variety of hospitals and GP clinics. Broadband enables the placement of a person at the centre of the health care system and this project is an innovative interdisciplinary partnership across the health and health technology sectors for the benefit of individuals and their communities.
The Clinical Hub will facilitate the coordination of GP and specialist management of patients with complex health issues, avoiding delays and duplication. The Hub will also support the collection of de-identified health data to facilitate research and assist in the development of preventive health initiatives through a patient portal.
The development of Clinical Hub technology provides a model that is transferable to other complex patient groups requiring coordinated multidisciplinary care across the primary care and hospital sectors leveraging the potential of high-speed broadband to deliver quality health outcomes for all Victorians.
This project is supported by the Victorian Government's Broadband-Enabled Innovation Program (BEIP)
Research Team
| Researcher/s | Department |
|---|---|
| Beverley-Ann Biggs, Georgia Paxton | Medicine |
| Karin Leder, Chris Lemoth, Caroline Marshall, Daniel O'Brien, Andrew Block | Royal Melbourne Hospital |
| Peter Cross, Jason Lohrey | Arcitecta |
Jon Hilton, Michael Georgeff |
Precedence Health Care |