Divisions & Medicare Locals

The Australian Primary Care Collaboratives (APCC) Program is one of the largest health quality improvement programs in Australia. The APCC works with many organisations to introduce a range of improvements in participating practices and health services across Australia.

Benefits of Using the Collaborative Methodology

  • The collaborative methodology uses knowledge about what already works rather than trying out new ideas through research or pilot studies.
  • It uses a change management method that is designed to identify where a change actually leads to an improvement.
  • Changes are tested in small cycles so they are manageable
  • Changes are measured so that the improvement can be demonstrated.

Benefits to Divisions and Medicare Locals

Just some of the benefits of being involved with the Program that your Division or Medicare Local may see are:

  • Improved health outcomes for patients
  • There’ll be training and development for Division or Medicare Local staff that will help them better support practices and health services
  • Enhanced collection and reporting of practice level data will help your Division or Medicare Local target areas for improvement and help inform strategic and business plans
  • In some cases, the information will help you report on the NPIs and support business cases for health improvement initiatives
  • Practices and health services participating in the program will make improvements and local leaders will emerge who will help your Division or Medicare Local further your local quality improvement agenda
  • A shift from reactive individual patient care to proactive population based care
  • Improved communication between your Division or Medicare Local and participating practices and health services.

Payments for Divisions and Medicare Locals

IF will provide you and your team with training and support to help you achieve your core funding objectives, and embed continuous quality improvement into the work you do with general practices and other health services in your region.

As part of the health reform agenda, Medicare Locals are now directly funded to support general practices and other health services embed quality improvement activities across their work. As such, no specific payment is available for Medicare Locals and Divisions to participate in this Collaborative wave. However, IF will fund the costs of travel and accommodation for all participants, including Medicare Local, Division, general practice and other health service teams to attend workshops.

Funding for practices and health services

As each wave requires different amounts of time away from the practice or health service, funding will vary from wave to wave. Each wave's brochure will contain information about what funding is available for participants.

What is required of my Division or Medicare Local?

IF will be on hand to guide you each step of the way. These are the key activities or steps involved:

  • IF will contact Divisions or Medicare Locals prior to a wave to seek expressions of interest
  • We’ll work together to finalise your participating practice numbers
  • Your Division or Medicare Local would then provide support to participating practices or health services
  • Participating Divisions or Medicare Locals will be required to complete monthly and wave based reporting. These reports are template based and relate to practice performance in the Program.
  • Initially, you’ll promote the Australian Primary Care Collaboratives (APCC) Program within your Division or Medicare Local, recruiting and supporting practices or health services participating in waves.

Once practices or health services have been recruited into a wave, you’ll provide a range of Program support functions to participating practices or health services. This includes coaching and motivating practices to apply and use the Program’s Model for Improvement, and other Quality Improvement techniques. IF will provide full training and support to your staff prior to the first wave, to enable them to provide Program support to your practices and health services.

Local waves

Following a national or state wave, your Division or Medicare Local may choose to promote and hold your own local workshop series. IF will assist you with the planning and implementation of a local Program and we will provide the funding for the agreed operational costs associated with the workshops. When delivering the Program locally, you may choose to partner with other Divisions in your area (to save costs or increase numbers).

Virtual waves

Some participants may find it difficult to allocate even short periods of time to leave the practice for workshops, or may be located in a geographically dispersed area. These practices may prefer to participate in virtual learning workshops where the Program is delivered via teleconferencing, videoconferencing, webinar, and online.

Recruiting Practices

How many practices within a Division or Medicare Local can participate?

Recruitment targets will depend on wave capacity and the number of Divisions or Medicare Locals and practices or health services interested in participating. IF will work with you to decide on recruitment targets, then you can work towards recruiting participants.

To support the promotion you do within your Division or Medicare Local, IF will provide you with recruitment materials, such as brochures, direct mail devices and other marketing materials to help you with the recruitment process.

What if my Division or Medicare Local wants to register participants over and above our agreed allocation?

In some instances, additional practices or health services are welcome to participate in the Program, however additional practices will not be funded by the Program. The cost for each practice or health service to participate in a wave differs depending on the type of wave. If this cost of participation can be funded via other means (including practices self-funding) and your Division or Medicare Local can provide support for the additional practices, then additional participation is possible. This will be subject to venue and overall wave capacity.

Training and Support for Divisions

Training for Division staff

Support staff in your Division or Medicare Local will have the opportunity to participate in training for the Program and Quality Improvement skills. Who actually takes part in the training will be pre-agreed with the Division or Medicare Local. The training and development opportunities will help your Division or Medicare Local's support team build capacity for supporting Quality Improvement activities in your general practice and health service community.

A primary point of contact at the Division or Medicare Local

Each Division or Medicare Local will nominate a primary point of contact for Program purposes. This person will provide a liaison, leadership and coordination role for practices and health services participating in the APCC Program. This person will be the lead support for the Program within the Division or Medicare Local and a main contact person for practices, IF, and the SBO.

Program training for Division or Medicare Local staff is generally delivered prior to the beginning of each wave, and in the days before each workshop. It can be delivered via a face-to-face workshop, webinar or teleconference, and throughout a wave IF may use a combination of all three delivery mediums.

Marketing support

You’ll support IF national and state-based marketing and promotion initiatives through promotional activity at the Division or Medicare Local. We will provide you with practice recruitment materials, such as brochures, direct mail devices and other marketing materials, to ensure your practices are informed about all aspects of the APCC Program. IF will also provide training and development to agreed Division or Medicare Local staff who will then lead the recruitment process from within your organisation.

Practice Data & Privacy

What Data is collected?

The Program collects aggregated practice level data only, specifically in the areas of diabetes, coronary heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, chronic disease prevention and self management and improving patient access to care. A practice participating in the APCC Program will only submit aggregated de-identified patient data (being percentage based measurements). This data does not include the personal health information of any of the practice’s patients.

Do Commonwealth privacy laws require practices to obtain patient consent to submit data?

No. Commonwealth privacy laws do not apply to de-identified information or statistical data sets which would not allow the patient to be identified.

What use will be made of information about the performance of the practice?

Improvement Foundation (IF) (the delivery organisation of the APCC Program) and the local Division or Medicare Local will only use information about the performance of a practice or health service in the Program (performance data) to help improve that practice or health service’s performance. IF will only use de-identified performance data (which does not identify the practice from which the performance data originates) for the purposes of reporting on and evaluating the Program. Aggregated de-identified performance data for multiple practices may be used to promote the benefits of the Program for quality system and health service improvements. The local Division or Medicare Local may use de-identified performance data for local quality system and service improvements.

If you would like to get involved with the Australian Primary Care Collaboratives Program, or would just like more information, please contact the Improvement Foundation.

Improvement Foundation
Level 5, 19 Grenfell St
Adelaide SA 5000
PO Box 3645 Rundle Mall SA 5000
T. 08 8422 7400 (or Toll Free 1800 771 522)
F. 08 8231 6690
E. enquiries@improve.org.au
W. www.improve.org.au

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last Updated 16 December 2011