The Senate Select Committee into the Commission of Audit is holding its third Hearing in Canberra today. Witnesses include the Consumers Health Forum and Australian Health and Hospitals Association, so…
Big announcements aren’t the answer – the health system needs a long-term plan.
AAP Image/Quentin Jones
This year is crunch time for Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s health policies. The financing and policy changes from the Rudd-Gillard government are finally taking effect and the National Commission of Audit…
Medicare guarantees free public hospital care and funds a range of primary care and other health services.
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Medicare is Australia’s universal health scheme. It is a Commonwealth government program that guarantees all citizens (and some overseas visitors) access to a wide range of health services at little or…
Some Australians are struggling to get timely access to affordable health care.
AAP Image/Dave Hunt
Tomorrow marks an important Australian milestone: 30 years of Medicare and the guarantee of universal access to health care. Before Medicare, it was not that uncommon for people to avoid using health-care…
Some insurers are testing opportunities to expand their involvement in primary care.
AAP Image/Mick Tsikas
Prompted by the government’s Commission of Audit, health policy analysts have spent the first weeks of the year vigorously debating ways to rein in Australia’s rising health budget and to make the system…
Medicare Locals plan for better, tailored health services by drawing on local knowledge.
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Primary health care in Australia is a messy beast, with many heads and all sorts of body parts. But it’s centrally important because it plays a major role in achieving public health outcomes, such as better…
An identical patient with an identical presenting symptom of ‘tension headache’ might lead to a thousand different discussions.
DIBP images
When we think of what defines a medical consultation, we quite reasonably think of the “presenting complaint”: the medical problem which the patient brings to the doctor. In movies, literature, common…
Co-payments are an unfair tool for reducing health costs.
Alex E. Proimos
As a GP, when I prescribe a drug, I need to know its likely benefits and risks, and I need to base my decision-making on the best available evidence. I’d like to think the same principle applies to the…
Innovative health policy solutions could help the health budget and improve patients’ health.
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Consensus and evidence suggests a compulsory co-payment of A$6 for a visit to the general practitioner will reduce population health but might save some money. Can we not try a bit harder and think of…
The financial pain of a A$6 co-payment won’t increase health literacy or self-management.
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Incremental creep and massive holes in universal health coverage (think dental care) have left many Australians questioning whether there’s any such thing as “free health care”. One recent study estimated…
Governments setting out to control spending, or move it in more efficient directions, must have strong backbones.
AAP Image/David Crosling
SECURING AUSTRALIA’S FUTURE: As the Commission of Audit reviews government activity and spending, The Conversation’s experts take a closer look at key policy areas tied to this funding – what’s working…
Peter Dutton and Tanya Plibersek at the National Press Club where, like the rest of the campaign, the parties seemed to vie to be blander.
Penny Bradfield/AAP
The dictionary has many words that could describe health policy in the 2013 federal election campaign – anodyne, soporific and vapid all come to mind. Australia’s health policy problems cannot afford the…
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott during a visit to St Vincents Hospital in Sydney, on the day the Coalition released its health policy.
Alan Porritt/AAP
The Coalition’s Policy to Support Australia’s Health System is a cautious document, despite shadow health minister Peter Dutton’s promise of a “cracker of a health policy”. Tony Abbott set the scene at…
This is one of the first elections in decades where health isn’t a headline issue.
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Welcome to the The Conversation’s Election 2013 State of the Nation essays. These articles by leading experts in their field provide an in-depth look at the key policy challenges affecting Australia as…
Paying the price for jumping the gun.
PA/Rebecca Naden
The NHS 111 telephone service was designed to direct people to the right help for urgent medical problems but has faced a barrage of criticism since it was implemented in April. The most recent blow was…
Dementia prevalence down but not out.
Flickr/Sparkle Glowplug
Dementia has been described as a ticking time bomb, with the number of those affected predicted to double in the next two decades. But a new study suggests that the prevalence of people with dementia in…
Not carpet bombs, but competition..
Pixabay/LoboStudioHamburg
Julian Le Grand, London School of Economics and Political Science
David Nicholson, the retiring Chief Executive of NHS England, has warned against what he called “carpet bombing” the NHS with competition. For him, and others, less focus on competition is a good thing…
The key question is whether the new prime minister regards the hospital system as having been fixed.
AAP Image/David Crosling
One of the key platforms of the first Rudd government was to reform the health and hospital system. The key message from then-prime minister Kevin Rudd was that the health, and particularly hospitals…
Passions run high when it comes to the NHS but despite some unprecedented challenges it will do what it always does - survive.
PA
The NHS in 2013 is facing a series of unprecedented challenges. A rapidly ageing population is just one of a number of factors fuelling a rise in demand for services and hospitals are struggling to cope…
One-third of rural patients wait 24 hours or longer for an urgent GP appointment.
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If you live far from a city, you are likely to be in poorer health than your urban counterparts; you’re also less likely to use health-care services and if you do, you’ll have to wait longer for care…
Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice and Primary Care, The University of Melbourne