Released 20/06/2019
The ACT Government is developing a new plan for children’s health services to make sure Canberra families get the healthiest start in life and can access the best possible services and programs through the ACT public health system.
This will be a comprehensive health plan for Canberra’s children—from birth, through the school years, and all the way into young adulthood at 16 years of age.
The plan will be developed over the next 12 months and will set out the government’s priorities, so we can continue to strengthen the healthcare provided to Canberra children and their families.
“Children deserve the best start in life and making sure they are healthy both physically and mentally is an important part of this,” Minister for Health and Wellbeing Meegan Fitzharris said.
“This is especially important in the first 1000 days of a new child’s life.
“We already have a wide range of healthcare services for children and adolescents in the ACT, but as our city grows, our health services need to grow too.
“To ensure our youngest community members and their families continue to get the best possible care and support, we will develop a new, comprehensive health plan for Canberra’s children and young people.”
The new children’s health services plan will cover ACT public health services and programs across the health continuum, from staying healthy, to accessing care in the community or in hospital, to rehabilitation and end of life care.
The plan will look at the ways we can strengthen our existing services and programs to support better outcomes, enhance patient and family experiences and improve access. We will also look at the future healthcare needs of 0 to 16-year-olds and how we can deliver smooth transitions of care to adult services where required.
Two key focus areas for the development of the plan will be:
- Working with families of children who are, or have needed to, share their care with other major city hospitals. The ACT currently provides a wide range of acute and community health services to local and regional families, however some specialist paediatric services are provided interstate as current demand in the ACT does not meet thresholds for local services to be safely and sustainably established and maintained. The new children’s health services plan will look at how we grow specialist paediatric services in the ACT and how we can better support families to improve care coordination and access to the health services they need in Canberra, when they are also receiving specialist support from interstate.
- Developing nation leading services and supports for new parents, whether it’s your first baby or your third. This will include consideration of both universally accessible services in areas such as breastfeeding support, perinatal mental health and early parenting support as well as services targeted at families with more complex needs. We will work across the health system, including with Tresillian the incoming provider of services at QEII.
Minister Fitzharris said engagement with children, young people and their families will play a key role in the development of the new plan.
“We know there are families in our community who have unfortunately had to navigate the healthcare system at a time when their child is very unwell. We want to learn from the experiences of these local families and provide them an opportunity to be part of and contribute to this important work, and we have asked the Healthcare Consumers Association to lead this work on our behalf” Minister Fitzharris said.
“We want to understand how to improve our services here in Canberra and map out the journey experienced by paediatric patients and their families, particularly where there is a need to travel interstate for specialist care.
“As part of the consultation, there will also be an emphasis on hearing from the clinical paediatric workforce across Canberra on how we can improve access and better coordinate services in the community and in our hospitals and best plan for the future healthcare needs of children.”
Executive Director of the Health Care Consumers’ Association Darlene Cox said “when children become seriously unwell it is a very difficult time for families.
“Not only are you managing the regular pressures of family life, but you also have to learn about a complicated and disconnected system and travel between cities and treating teams. At the same time, you are building a body of knowledge and set of skills, so you can advocate for your child.
“This work will enable our local health system to learn from the experiences of families who have dealt with these challenges and bring about changes to make it easier for the families who will be faced with this in future,” Ms Cox said.
- Statement ends -
Meegan Fitzharris, MLA | Media Releases
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