Regional Mental Health Services

The Hon. G.G. BROCK (Stuart) (14:45): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing. Can the minister please advise my constituents on how the government is endeavouring to address the critical shortage of psychologists in regional areas, and when my constituents can expect improved access to affordable and timely mental health care? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain further.

Leave granted.

The Hon. G.G. BROCK: Constituents in my regional electorate are facing significant challenges in accessing psychiatric care, particularly for ADHD medication prescriptions. The few local specialists available have lengthy waitlists, leaving many with no choice but to seek costly telehealth consultations, often with interstate specialists, with fees up to $700 with only minimum Medicare rebates.

The Hon. C.J. PICTON (Kaurna—Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (14:46): I thank the member for Stuart for his question. It is an important question in terms of our mental health workforce for his community and across the state and country as well. The member's question was in relation to psychologists, which is an important issue. The explanation then went to the issue in terms of prescribing medication for ADHD. It would be psychiatrists who would provide that service, although with both psychologists and psychiatrists there are workforce needs and I will address both of those.

In terms of psychologists, we have been working with the relevant workforce groups and unions in terms of the development of a psychology plan for SA Health in particular, but understanding as well that the psychology need is not just in terms of SA Health. My colleague the Minister for Child Protection employs many psychologists, the Minister for Education employs many psychologists and of course in the community there are many psychologists who provide important services under the Better Access Medicare scheme and other private referral services that people need to be able to access.

Right across the country there are issues in terms of the availability of psychologists, particularly since NDIS services have become an increased user of those services as well. So we are working in terms of how do we unleash a further pipeline of psychologists, understanding that there is a large number of people who go in to undertake bachelor's degrees in psychology but it's a very small number of people who end up at the end of that funnel who are able to provide services as a clinical psychologist.

The key issue is how we can create that capacity for the university in terms of the master's degrees and other pathways for people to go from that bachelor's degree to being able to provide clinical practice. A lot of that comes down to supervision and I give credit to the Albanese federal government which has invested somewhat in terms of increasing that capacity for additional supervised places to happen, but we would like to see more of that.

In relation to ADHD, which is an increasing need in the community, we have seen an increasing amount of demand for those services and for that medication that has put more strain in terms of the psychiatric workforce across the country. That is why one of our election commitments, in fact, was to develop with The Royal Australian & New Zealand College of Psychiatrists a dedicated workforce plan for the availability of psychiatrists, understanding not only the needs such as the ones you have outlined but also the increasing number of mental health beds we are putting in in terms of our public services and also other private services, in particular the increasing need for child psychiatrists as well. So again, it is about how we create that training pipeline. We have been working on that plan. It's very close to completion and I look forward to releasing that shortly, which will chart the way for how we can increase the number of psychiatrists here in South Australia into the future.

In terms of ADHD in particular, one of the issues that has been raised by the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, and also by a number of other stakeholders, and which has recently been raised in Western Australia and to which the Western Australian government have made a commitment is: could the scope of practice for general practitioners be increased to allow them to make those assessments in terms of ADHD and the prescribing of that medication?

That is something that we are interested in exploring and looking at whether there's a change that we could make in South Australia. We are talking to Western Australia about the work that they have done in this area and ultimately that would unleash a big additional capacity for people to access that ADHD assistance.