Creating high quality integrated care that delivers outcomes Masterclass

Integrated care is a global phenomenon across developed and developing countries seeking to make health and care systems both co-ordinated and person-centred. Australia is no exception to this, with the Productivity Commission’s recent Productivity Review highlighting the creation of integrated care as a key priority. The arguments for integration are many – ageing demographics, increasing complexity of conditions, continued health inequalities and poor patient experience – with health and care services struggling to collaborate successfully across organisational and sectoral boundaries. Successfully addressing fragmentation in pathways, practice and purposes would potentially improve outcomes and make services more effective and efficient.

The common building blocks of a more integrated system are well recognised – stratification to help target resources, multi-disciplinary teams to bring together professionals, new roles to address delivery and co-ordination gaps, and purchasing for population level outcomes. Delivering these in practice and at scale and evidencing that expected impacts have been achieved requires constructive leadership and sustained interest. This masterclass will explore the hopes and realities of integrated care through the lenses of policy, research and practice. It will provide the latest thinking on how it can best be planned, implemented and evaluated and the leadership approaches which will inspire and bring together those from across a health and care system. Delivered by researchers with international reputations in the fields of integration, collaboration and leadership it will provide a challenging and interactive masterclass.

This masterclass was led by internationally respected researchers in their field, Dr Robin Miller, of the University of Birmingham, UK, and Associate Professor Helen Dickinson, and Dr Karen Gardner, both of UNSW Canberra.