The Western Australia (WA) Primary Health Alliance HealthPathways team recently celebrated achieving 400 localised pathways, with party food that set a new standard for the HealthPathways Community.
The WA Primary Health Alliance, which operates WA’s three Primary Health Networks, launched HealthPathways as a state-wide program in 2015. Since then they have been busy localising pathways and recently commenced reviewing published pathways.
Delivering a state-wide programme has enabled the HealthPathways team to engage with a range of stakeholders and facilitate collaboration, while overcoming the challenge of WA’s vast and diverse regions.
One successful strategy to promote the programme has been the inclusion of HealthPathways at Perth hospital events.
The team collaborated with five hospitals this year to organise full-day education events for general practitioners, where specialists linked to HealthPathways in their presentations.
There are also four more GP education events being prepared for the second half of the year. WA Primary Health Alliance HealthPathways lead GP clinical editor, Dr Sue Jackson said the education events had been very successful.
“They have been embraced by both GPs and specialists as an opportunity to work together to improve patient care,” she said.
The team has also been driving system redesign by collaborating with WA hospitals and health services to implement new ENT referral criteria last year, and neurology this year, to reduce waiting lists for outpatient specialist appointments.
Dr Jackson said the ongoing collaboration between HealthPathways and the WA Health Services has already produced some great outcomes in terms of system redesign and navigation.
To celebrate achieving 400 localised pathways, the team set up a HealthPathways bulk-billing GP clinic in the staff lunchroom where GP clinical editors prescribed “medications” for staff related to localised pathways to help cure “Tuesdayitis”.
With party food that has now set a catering standard for the HealthPathways Community, the offerings included codeine made of jelly beans, rice crispy brains (neurology), cotton balls made of marshmallows, needlestick injury cupcakes with added syringes (immunisation), enlarged heart cookies (cardiology), and gummy eyeballs (ophthalmology).
Members of the WA Primary Health Alliance Team at the celebration event.
Top from left - Emily Moore (HealthPathways Coordinator), Emily Foyster (HealthPathways Project Officer), Stef Colquhoun (Project support), Dr Linda Kohler, Sue Gedeon (HealthPathways Coordinator), Leah Vikingur (HealthPathways Coordinator), Magda Matuszczyk (HealthPathways Team Leader)
Bottom from left - Dr Sue Jackson, Dr Irene Dolan, Dr Richa Tayal, Dr Danielle Rebbettes
Jelly beans "codeine", "band-aid" biscuits and "ear swabs" - delicious!
"Enlarged hearts", "clogged arteries" and "thermometers", all with the relevant pathway marked.
"Needlestick injury" cupcakes.
Looking ahead, the team will explore ways to establish working groups tailored for country regions, implement the HealthPathways mobile-friendly platform, and further implement system redesign projects.
Andy Froggatt, HealthPathways Chief Implementation Advisor says, “The WA HealthPathways team have done an outstanding job, not just in reaching their 400th localised pathway, but in using the processes behind HealthPathways as a key enabler for integrated care development across the WA health system.”
“I’ve been particularly impressed at the amazing level of engagement they have facilitated with rural and remote services to ensure that support via HealthPathways is highly relevant wherever you practise in the diverse state that is WA.”
“Of the 400 pathways that have been localised, 100 were localised in just nine months. That’s quite an achievement - here’s to 600!” he added.
The initiatives of the WA team in system redesign, linking educational opportunities with GP events, establishing working groups, and taking the time to have some fun along the way, are great engagement strategies that are clearly yielding results.
For more information and ideas on how to encourage GPs to engage with HealthPathways, see also:
If you have any questions about the achievements of the Western Australia Primary Health Alliance HealthPathways team, please contact Magda Matuszczyk, HealthPathways Team Lead, magdalena.matuszczyk@wapha.org.au