Australian Primary Care Collaboratives
The APCC Program has resulted in key changes within Australian primary care and better health outcomes for patients with chronic disease, including:
- Improved patient care through better management of Chronic Disease
- Increased best practice care through better use of information systems (both medical and business systems)
- Evolving roles among practice staff to better meet patient demand
- A cultural shift from individual patient care to population based care
The current APCC program involving 6 Townsville practices concludes in March 2011. TMML will then be facilitating Local Collaborative programs continuing into 2011/12
- Townsville Local Collaboratives
- Enhanced Diabetes Management
- Mental Health Collaborative
Objectives
The objective of the APCC Program is to encourage and support general practices throughout Australia in delivering rapid, measurable, systematic and sustainable improvements in the care they provide to patients, through the sound understanding and effective application of quality improvement methods and skills.
The Topic Aims
The Australian Primary Care Collaboratives (APCC) Program has focused its efforts on three topics: diabetes, secondary prevention of coronary heart disease (CHD) and access and care redesign. To build on this work, the APCC Program has introduced two new topics: Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and Chronic Disease Prevention and Self Management (CDPSM).
The aim for Access and Care Redesign:
90% of patients should be able to access their primary healthcare professional of choice on the day of their choice.
The aim for Diabetes:
50% of patients with diabetes type 1 or diabetes type 2 within participating practices should have a HbA1c of 7.0% or less.
The aim for CHD:
30% reduction in the mortality of patients with CHD in three years.
The aim for COPD:
To reduce by 30% the number of hospital admissions (compared to the previous 12 months) for respiratory illness in patients with COPD.
The aim for CDPSM:
Increase the identification of those with risk factors for chronic disease and implement strategies to mitigate these risks, including self management. Through this we aim to assess risk factor status in 50% of those for whom it is recommended and reduce the number of risk factors that are not at target by 20%.
