Transforming Health

The Hon. T.A. FRANKS (14:45): My question is to the Minister for Health on Transforming Health. Of the 284 clinical standards that were identified as part of Transforming Health's failure to meet 52 of the clinical standards, given we are now meeting an additional 10 clinical standards, and there are only 42 not being met, what are the 10 clinical standards that Transforming Health has now delivered?

The Hon. P. MALINAUSKAS (Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse) (14:45): Let me thank the honourable member for her question. Transforming Health has been a very significant undertaking on behalf of the Labor government. We acknowledge on this side of the chamber that when you are in government you have to accept the responsibility of making sure that you are continuing to evolve key agencies to be able to improve health care. The thing is that most people who pay attention to any form of public policy, but this is particularly true in the case of health where there are rapidly evolving techniques and technologies, know that there is a need to evolve policy, and there is a need to evolve the way we do things.

That is what Transforming Health largely acknowledges: that we have a changing world and operating environment around us, we have a federal government that has been cutting public health funding consistently, starting off most recently with Tony Abbott, of course, and that being continued by the conservative government ever since. So, there is a need at our level of government to ensure that we have key reform pieces in place that are all about delivering high quality, productive outcomes into the long term.

The Transforming Health project, as I have stated previously, is largely complete. There still remain ongoing issues that we are addressing and many of those are on the record. We are implementing a change in policy in respect to The QEH; we have a review of services underway at Modbury, which is reaching a conclusion. That represents a very thorough public policy undertaking which stands in stark contrast to the Liberal Party who rushed out a Modbury health policy just because there was a reshuffle. We are getting on with a methodical review of what we do at Modbury.

There are other parts of Transforming Health that have largely been implemented and have delivered good results, and they are probably worth reflecting upon. Let's take, for example, the stroke model of care. In 2016-17, we saw that about 78 per cent of all stroke patients were admitted to designated stroke wards across metropolitan hospitals. We saw this being an improvement of approximately 4 per cent compared to the previous year. More stroke patients are now receiving routine physiotherapy assessments to inform their rehabilitation goals.

The RAH made significant improvement in 2016 with an increase of 6 per cent of patient admissions to a designated stroke unit when compared to the previous year. The Lyell McEwin has made dramatic improvements in timely access to physiotherapy assessment with 92 per cent of patients receiving routine assessments in 2016-17. We have had a new model of care for rehabilitation services. The new rehab service model has resulted in 70 more full-time staff being employed since the start of 2017 across our LHNs to support the expansion of ambulatory rehabilitation.

This includes staff and allied health roles, nurses and enabling infrastructure costs to support tele-rehab. It also means the integration of rehabilitation services into our major hospitals so that patients can receive rehabilitation sooner and get home quicker. We have seen improvements in the areas of acute hip fracture management, after-hours senior clinical cover, and a 12-month pilot underway at the Lyell McEwin is occurring. Based on the successes of the pilot so far, planning is in place for the implementation at the RAH, FMC and also Women's and Children's.

We have seen improvements in the area of acute coronary syndrome. We have seen improvements in infrastructure, some of which continue. So, Transforming Health, despite the cynics, despite the scaremongering that has occurred perennially from the opposition, has delivered good results for our public health system. That is something that our government can be proud of, but we want to continue that work into the future.