Page 1557 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 8 May 2018
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As part of this framework, ACT Health has commenced the process of developing our mental health specialty service plan, which will detail a more robust organisational structure. The plan will address models of service delivery and care, service innovation, quality and safety, workforce, reporting and monitoring, governance and strategic policy alignment. In doing this, ACT Health understands that there is a great deal of expertise in the wider ACT community, which ACT Health is very keen to tap into.
ACT Health is also working with the Capital Health Network to develop an integrated regional mental health plan. This is a key commitment under the fifth national mental health and suicide prevention plan. Work is well underway on a considered, consultative and evidence-based approach. This process involves the use of evidence-based mapping and planning tools that report on mental health services and demand projections for the region.
Consumers and carers are also contributing a significant voice to the process to understand how to more effectively integrate services and to improve access pathways. Furthermore, international evidence demonstrates that high-performing healthcare systems involve a strong and engaged primary care sector providing the right care as early as possible. The regional plan is crucial to developing a better and more responsive system for people seeking help across primary health care, community agencies and specialist mental health services. We are committed to continuing to work with the commonwealth to better integrate services where they are impacted by different levels of government.
This work, in parallel with the office for mental health and wellbeing, will help to ensure the integration of mental health services across the continuum of care. It will help to identify current gaps, reduce duplication and ultimately make it easier for patients to navigate the system and to find the services they need.
The third matter that I wish to update the Assembly on is the government’s strategies to attract and retain more medical professionals, including mental health professionals, in Canberra, with a focus on the field of child and adolescent mental health. ACT Health is continuing to undertake recruitment for permanent medical staff and junior medical staff interested in training in psychiatry.
We are working collaboratively with the Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation and the ACT branch of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists on this issue through the mental health division’s medical workforce working group. As I have spoken about before, attracting a sufficient number of psychiatrists is a challenge across Australia at the moment. That is why a comprehensive response is needed to this complex issue.
The working group is developing a strategic plan which will take into account recruitment and retention strategies, projected population needs, workforce numbers and sub-specialty skill mix, and local factors that are having an impact upon recruitment and retention of psychiatrists within the ACT public mental health system.
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