IFIC Australia has made solid progress since our last newsletter with work done by partners on developing case studies based on work in their services, responses to the Productivity Commission report on Integrated Care and planning for the 2nd Asia-Pacific (APIC) conference.
A group of case studies has been selected for dissemination from the original batch prepared by our partner, Children’s Health Queensland.
Opportunities will be then be sought to make them publicly and internationally available.
We welcome our new partner, the Australian Hospital and Healthcare
Association. We are honoured to have you aboard and look forward to working with you to develop integrated care in Australia.
It has been decided that rather than respond directly to the Productivity
Commission’s December 2017 report, we write a series of advocacy commentaries on Integrated Care that have come out of the work that has been done to date.
The Commission’s Report would be used as a key report to be cited with a focus on “collective impact”. Any ideas relating to services for Older People
and Mental Health Services in particular would be welcome but again anything that would focus attention on practical steps towards implementing Federal and State policy initiatives around Integrated Health and Social Services care would be gratefully received.
There are now several Special Interest Groups (SIGs) in operation, covering speciality areas such as Children’s Health, Older People’s Health and others. If you would like to suggest another group, please let us know.
We have revised the documents that profile and give information relating to IFICA activities and aspirations and how to become partners of IFICA. These include the new fee structure which takes into account the different sizes of organisations. If your organisation is interested in receiving these please write to Lucy McEvoy at lucy.mcevoy@newcastle.edu.au
Planning is proceeding apace with the 2nd Asia Pacific Integrated Care Conference. It is now set for 11-13 November in Melbourne. There
will also be another Accelerated Learning Programme offered by IFICA in Orange during the week of 4 November at the Centre for Rural and Remote Mental Health.
April is going to be a busy month. On 17 April an afternoon of events will be
held at the University of Newcastle’s Sydney Campus based around the IFIC CEO Nick Goodwin’s visit. Please come along and also advise your colleagues of the programme which includes a free access seminar, launch of the APIC2 conference and IFICA Work Plan discussion and a partner’s meeting.
And finally, for those who find they now have time to go don’t forget The 19th International conference on Integrated Care is being held in San Sebastian in the Basque Country April 1-3. Details on the IFIC website.
Peter McGeorge is the Chair of IFIC Australia