Regional Health Services

Mr HUGHES (Giles) (15:00): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing. Can the minister update the house on recent changes to healthcare services in regional South Australia?

The Hon. C.J. PICTON (Kaurna—Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (15:00): Thank you to the member for Giles for this question. There is a lot of news that has been happening in regional South Australia in improving health services across the board. Most notably, with the member for Narungga a few weeks ago, I was up at the Wallaroo Hospital. It was a delight to visit the new rehabilitation unit at the hospital. This is a service that hasn't been in operation anywhere in the region before. It's about to start operations for the first time.

It means that patients who are getting their rehab are able to do that locally within the region. That's going to be a significant benefit, not only for our health system overall, reducing pressure on our city hospitals, but also of course better for those patients to be able to receive that care closer to home.

We met the team, led by Lyndal, the clinical lead. We saw the new facilities that are being constructed there at the Wallaroo Hospital. We met the team and saw the equipment that's going to be used. Importantly as well, it's also going to involve remote ability to have rehabilitation as well. People will be provided with equipment and technology to be able to do that, and so they can stay closer to home.

Of course, this is not the only improvement that we are making at Wallaroo Hospital. We are set to increase the amount of chemotherapy happening in the hospital there as well, which will mean more cancer patients will be able to get that care closer to home.

Also, when we were there we had the ability to speak to a number patients, including Sharon, who spoke about what a difference the increase we have made to PATS has been, in terms of that additional doubling of the PATS fuel rebate, reducing pressure on country patients across South Australia. Of course, that previous rate had been in place for decades and decades, and since January this year we have now increased it, relieving a lot of pressure on regional South Australians.

In addition to this, we have also recently announced a new program, a 24/7 health remote monitoring service. This is going to be operating across regional South Australia, where regional patients will be provided, in collaboration with their GP, with remote monitoring equipment—with tablets and with devices that can monitor all their vital signs—and then linked with nurses who will be operating 24/7 to keep in touch with those patients to make sure that there is no deterioration in their condition and to make sure that they are healthy in the community. It will ultimately reduce pressure on our regional hospitals as well.

This has certainly been welcomed by a number of general practitioners across regional South Australia as relieving pressure on them and meaning that those regional patients can get a better identification of where their vital signs are deteriorating and get the appropriate follow-up care that they need. It will also reduce the number of people who have to be stuck in hospital for longer for that monitoring process to happen.

At the same time we have also launched another platform, called the Zeus platform, which is making it easy for Telestroke appointments across regional South Australia. Of course, when you have a stroke, every minute counts. Regional hospitals will now be able to save up to 30 minutes when they access those telehealth consultations with neurologists in Adelaide. That's another very exciting development that has happened in regional South Australia as well.

In addition, at the same time, we are employing a significant number of additional nurses in our regional hospitals as well. The member for MacKillop and I were excited that at the Millicent hospital we now have those graduate nurses who are going to be working there for the first time for a very significant period of time. Many other country locations are doing that at the same time. As well, we now have trainee doctors operating on Eyre Peninsula as well. So some exciting news in our regions.