Search Results for: health information

Health Information

Posted on June 15, 2015

Information is essential for you to be confident and empowered when making choices about your own health care.

Knowledge about health issues is constantly changing. Every year increases the sum of human knowledge through scientific and medical research, and consumers are empowered who are able to access and understand new information, relevant to their health care.

Warning on using the Internet

The Internet can be an invaluable source of up to date information, about medical conditions, illnesses, research findings, services and other issues of importance to you. However, the quality and reliability of health – related sites on the Internet are varied. Accuracy is not guaranteed. Further, each health consumer or patient is an individual, whose condition is unique. Not all advice on the Internet is good. Not all advice will be relevant or safe for you. A good approach to using the Internet is to make notes on the information that interests you and then discuss it with the doctor or other health professional who is treating you.

Click here to access our list of health sites

Information about the WA Health System

Posted on April 1, 2020

We have collected or developed the below resources to help newly arrived migrants, people who are unfamiliar with the WA health system, and/or those who do not have English as a first language. Not all resources are available in languages other than English, but where available we have provided links.

Covid-19 multicultural resources – A collection of Covid resources in languages other than English from both government and reputable other organisations.  Includes a video about the government’s COVIDsafe app available in 8 different languages and also a link to download a Covid information app in language.

Overview of the WA Health System  – This Government of WA, Department of Health page gives a brief overview of the WA public health system and how it is divided up (geographically) into the  metropolitan services of North Metropolitan Health Service, The South Metropolitan Health Service and The East Metropolitan Health Service plus the The Child and Adolescent Health Service and WA Country Health Service for regional and remote.  Links to each of these services are provided on the page.

Medicare eligibility and enrolling – This Australian Government page explains who is eligible for Medicare and how to enrol for a Medicare number / card.

About Medicare – This Australian Government page explains what is covered by Medicare and how to make claims (for money back or rebates)

Choosing Private Health Insurance – This page by the Commonwealth Ombudsman for Private Health Insurance explains how private health works in Australia and provides information on choosing a policy.

Your healthcare rights – This Health Consumers’ Council page explains your (legal) rights in healthcare around informed consent and the right to competent care.  Links also to more detail about mental health rights.

Going to hospital – Easy English Version – This is a Health Consumers’ Council produced brief brochure which explains (in simple English with few words and plenty of images) what to expect if you are going to hospital.  Includes what to pack and a bit about what to expect when you get home.

Going to hospital – Languages Other Than English – The above mentioned Health Consumers’ Council brochure is available in Farsi, Arabic, Urdu, Dari and Karen.

Choosing the right health service – This animated video from Health Direct (available in English, Arabic, Bengali, Chinese and Vietnamese) explains when it’s appropriate to use an online information resource, consult a telephone or online health help line, consult a pharmacist, consult your GP or go to hospital.

The role of a GP  – This animated video from Health Direct (available in English, Arabic, Bengali, Chinese and Vietnamese) explains the role of a General Practitioner (GP) or local, family doctor.  It explains what a GP can do for your and your family and how and when they will pass you over to a specialist doctor.  It explains how to find, choose and access a GP.

Paying for Healthcare – This animated video from Health Direct (available in English, Arabic, Bengali, Chinese and Vietnamese) discusses the cost of various health services and what services are covered by Medicare, the government scheme that helps Australians pay for healthcare.

Maternity Services – This animated video from Health Direct (available in English, Arabic, Bengali, Chinese and Vietnamese) looks at options for pregnancy care and where to give birth in Australia and the costs associated with the services.

Baby’s First Weeks – This animated video from Health Direct (available in English, Arabic, Bengali, Chinese and Vietnamese) looks and the services and support you can receive in the weeks post birth of a baby when living in Australia.

Mental Health – Link to the Embrace Multicultural Mental Health portal which is for both community and services providers.  For community there is a range of mental health resources in multiple languages as well as some personal stories and a list of community support organisations.

Five Questions To Ask Your Doctor – This is a Choosing Wisely provided resource, available in multiple languages, which provides five (5) questions which it is sensible to ask your doctor before opting for any test or treatment (together with a brief explanation as to why each is important).

Speaking Up and Giving Feedback – Link to the Health Consumers’ Council page of “self-advocacy” resources.  It provides key resources and links to websites to support yourself in the health system, and provide feedback to our health services.

The Health Translations Directory – A Victorian Government library of health resources which have been translated into multiple languages.  A very well stocked library which you can search via topic / condition or via language.

 

If you are from a Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CaLD) background or work with people from a CaLD background then please participate in our survey on available health literacy resources for CaLD populations.   

Click here to complete the survey

Health services are under pressure around the world – here’s how you can help in WA

Posted on June 5, 2025

Right now, health services are under pressure around the world. In this LinkedIn post an ED doctor in the UK shares his perspectives on why people might be experiencing long waits in Emergency Departments.

Need healthcare that can’t wait?

If you’re seeking healthcare which is unplanned but is not an emergency or life-threatening – and it can’t wait until you can get an appointment with a GP – there are a few options that don’t require you to sit for a long time in an Emergency Department:

  • Call HealthDirect or visit the website for advice and information 24/7 – this service has been significantly improved in recent years and includes the option to discuss your symptoms with a registered nurse.

 

  • Visit an Urgent Care Centre
    • There are two types of Urgent Care Centres in WA
      • Medicare Urgent Care Centres are free at the point of care – you can find your nearest online at https://www.health.gov.au/find-a-medicare-ucc or by calling HealthDirect on 1800 022 222
        • You may be able to walk-in, or need to make an appointment – check with the centre closest to you
      • Other urgent care centres – such as those provided by St John Health – provide urgent care without an appointment with a fee to be paid.
        • You will need to pay up-front but Medicare Card holders will get a Medicare rebate.
        • The up-front costs can range from $168 Monday to Friday to $310 on public holidays
        • The out of pocket costs (after the rebate) range from approx $125 Monday to Friday to $175 on public holidays
        • You can find your nearest online at https://www.health.gov.au/find-a-medicare-ucc or by calling HealthDirect on 1800 022 222

 

 

  • Emergency or life-threatening illnesses or injuries require immediate medical attention by an emergency department or hospital. For example, things like chest pain, breathing difficulties, severe burns, poisoning, loss of feeling, and seizures.

If you do need to attend an Emergency Department, you can get an idea of how long you might be waiting from the WA Health website showing up to date wait times at https://www.health.wa.gov.au/reports-and-publications/emergency-department-activity/data?report=ed_activity_now

Other ways you can play your part in reducing the need for hospital care

 

  • Maintain good health hygiene habits
    • if you’re unwell, reduce the chance of infecting others by staying home, wearing a mask if out in public, and wash your hands regularly
      • and in particular, take action to reduce the chance of infecting older people in your community or family
    • pay attention to air quality in homes and buildings

HCC’s advocacy in this area

At HCCWA we are actively advocating for the interests of health consumers including patients, carers and family members in relation to ensure affordable access to healthcare across primary, community and hospital settings. This includes providing input on the WA Government’s work in relation to virtual care, care for older people, and emergency access.

 

A long awaited win in sight for transparency on health costs

Posted on March 17, 2025

By Clare Mullen, Executive Director

Today – 17 March 2025 – the Federal Minister for Health and Aged Care, Mark Butler – is speaking to a range of media outlets about his announcement that, if re-elected, a Federal Labor Government will be publishing the costs of specialist medical fees on the Government’s Medical Costs Finder website.

But wait – isn’t that the website that was set up in 2019 to do exactly that? Well, yes. But it wasn’t mandatory for doctors to add their information. And so only 70 of them did. Out of approximately 11,000 specialists in Australia.

As I highlighted in this blog article last May, it’s important that consumers – in this case patients – have access to cost information in order to make their decision about where to get specialist treatment.

Health Consumers’ Council WA represents the interest of consumers, and WA consumers particularly, on the Federal Government’s Out of Pocket Costs Transparency Reference Group. Through that group, we advocated that any health service provider that receives public funding should be required to publish their pricing information on the Medical Costs Finder website.

We hope that whoever is in Government after the next election will follow through on this commitment to patient and consumer power and ensure people can make informed decisions about specialist healthcare.

Opinion: It’s time for full transparency on who’s making money out of our healthcare

Health consumer priorities in the WA state election

Posted on March 6, 2025

This is a follow on from our blog post outlining our priorities and listing the election commitments from the two major parties against those priorities.

Based on our discussions with consumers HCC’s priorities for health are:

  • Increased access to affordable primary care
  • Increased investment in things that help us stay healthy (preventative measures)
  • Continued improvement in the safety, efficiency and capacity of the hospital system
  • Improved access to health care in the community and closer to home.

Many of our allies in the health consumer and lived experience sector have published their specific requests for election time.  Their answers tell an interesting story of a sector where incredible work could be done if there was adequate funding, but also where there are some excellent, innovative ideas that would not be particularly costly to implement.

Let’s have a look at what’s being asked for:

Carers WA Carers Count at the 2025 State Election | Carers WA

  • $400,000 Carer hardship and carer respite grants program for WA Carers
  • Establish a Carers card
  • A new carers strategy
  • $890 000 support for young carers in regional areas
  • Establish a service navigation system for carers

Aboriginal Health Council of WA WA State Election: AHCWA’s Key Priorities – AHCWA

  • Culturally safe short stay accommodation for pregnant women
  • Affordable and appropriate housing
  • Funding for Aboriginal Environmental Health Model of care and community capacity building for remote maintenance
  • Free dental care for all Aboriginal people in WA
  • Social and emotional wellbeing and family and domestic and sexual violence program funding
  • Improved child development services
  • PATS Coordinator in each region

Developmental Disability WA Election Undertakings 2025 for people with intellectual disability

  • Introduce mandatory training on intellectual disabilities for all health staff.
  • Set up Specialist Disability Health Hubs in each health region to improve the health and mental health of PwID.
  • Ensure the State health plan includes PwID as a priority group.
  • Introduce a “flag” to identify intellectual disability in a person’s WA health record
  • Contribute to a WA Easy Read website that provides key public information about health and other government services.

Consumers of Mental Health WA Election 2025: An Election for Mental Health – Consumers of Mental Health WA

  • An alternative to Emergency departments for people in emotional crisis
  • Increase finding to co designed community and peer led mental health services
  • Independent review, co-led by people with lived experience, on strategies to eliminate force, seclusion and restraint
  • Enhance access to advocacy through mental health advocacy service
  • Commit to a human rights act for WA
  • Secure and sustainable funding to pilot Aboriginal community controlled services
  • Embark on funded commitment to the Gayaa Dhuwi declaration implementation plan

Council on the Ageing WA 2025 Election Platform  – Council On The Ageing WA

  • Waive stamp duty for people aged over 65
  • Incorporate Silver Housing Standards in the WA Building Code
  • Expand the supply of affordable housing
  • Introduce a $150 “Fit for Life” voucher for seniors, modelled on the Kidsport initiative
  • Fund a “Preparing for the Unexpected” program to support seniors who are likely to be hospitalised due to a complex health issue or frailty
  • Fund a falls prevention program
  • Provide ongoing $250 000 per annum to Council on the Ageing WA

These priorities have been informed by health consumers, people with lived experience, and input from members of the above organisations. Amplifying and championing the voices of consumers and people with lived experience leads to better outcomes, whether that be in policy development or program delivery.

Including consumer voices goes beyond consultation, it means properly involving people who use the health system to help all of us to understand and address the unfairness in the system.  

What we see when we look at this list is a commitment to important preventative health projects, and projects that would make our health system fairer for all.

These ideas would all contribute to healthier, more connected community members, who are receiving the assistance they need in their communities. This in turn improves the patient experience in our health system and reduces the pressure on the public hospital system meaning that those who need healthcare can get it promptly.

If you’ve any thoughts about any of these, please contact Bronwyn Ife at bronwyn.ife@hconc.org.au

Digital Health Series – Interoperability

Posted on August 13, 2024

At the time of this post, WA Health has been funded for the next three years to write the specifications and choose a vendor to develop an Electronic Medical Record, or EMR. This will be a statewide EMR for WA Health’s public hospitals and health services. From January to June 2024 HCC has been working with our EMR Consumer Reference Group to up-skill ourselves on all things digital, so we are able to provide the consumer voice into this part of the process. In March 2024 we convened a webinar entitled Can the EMR stitch up our health system? This blog has links to the replay, transcripts and summary and provides insights into what consumers need to think about. Consumer involvement in WA’s EMR is being funded by WA Health to ensure a strong consumer voice. WA has been leading the nation in the level of consumer involvement in this important initiative.

This blog series has been written by Pip Brennan who is working for HCC on the project, co-located in the Health Department.

Interoperability is just a fancy word for your health information following you, from GP to hospital, allied provider to pharmacist to specialist and back again. In 2021, HCC co-designed an Electronic Medical Record Consumer Charter which has this to say about interoperability:

  • Accuracy: My health records are complete, accurate and up to date.
  • Equitable care: My health records are available to my treating clinicians regardless of where I am being treated.
  • Transparency, Choice and Control:  I have access to my real-time health information at no cost to me or my family.

I’m just pausing for a moment to remind people of the difference between an Electronic Medical Record and My Health Record. The dot points from the Charter above refer to WA’s future Electronic Medical Record. The Electronic Medical Record and My Health Record are different as per the image below. An Electronic Medical Record is based within a hospital or health service. My Health Record contains federally based information such as GP care and immunisation records. We want the two to talk to each other. That is interoperability.

Image highlighting the difference between My Health Record (federal, GP and scripts etc) and Electronic Medical Record (state-based, everything that happens within the hospital walls

Australia is doing a significant amount of work on interoperability at a national level. We now have a National Healthcare Interoperability Plan, and this potentially offers WA an opportunity to have a more joined-up EMR than other states and territories who developed their EMRs prior to this policy coming into being.

There’s a change in the air that as if to say everyone recognises that we have an opportunity, probably a once in not just a single generation, but multi generation opportunity to fundamentally transform the way our health system works

Harry Iles Mann

Webinar – Can an EMR stitch up our health system?

Because of all the work happening nationally, we invited National Consumer Leader and Digital Health Expert Harry Iles Mann to talk with WA’s Chief Clinical Information Officer Dr Peter Sprivulis about WA’s Electronic Medical Record and how that could connect up our health care.

You can read the whole transcript, or highlights here, or watch the whole replay here.

Key messages about interoperability:

  • It’s all about culture. The technology is the easy bit. It’s the culture that is the difficult aspect to digital health transformation.
  • Get workflows right. Ensure that the words mean the same on each side of the transaction – that GPs and hospital staff mean the same thing. e.g. allergies.
  • Legal and regulatory levels. There is potential for the My Health Record Act to be broadened to become My Health Information Act. This will provide a safety for health consumers, and puts very clear obligations on health services to share data appropriately. This is a long term reform.
  • Financial and cultural piece – we need to deal with perverse incentives to make the right thing the easy thing for clinicians. For example, currently if a GP speaks to a specialist about a patient, neither is compensated, even though this could expedite care for a patient and avoid unnecessary, inconvenient, costly consultations. There needs to be a joined-up conversation with private, public, state and federal health to sort this out.
  • My Health Record is still key – There is ongoing investment in the My Health Record as a platform to facilitate interoperability and consumer access to their information. Yes, My Health Record has its issues – but a key reason for the ongoing investment is that regardless of what states and territories or different vendors do in developing EMRs, there will be something that is sitting within the custodianship of government that is a point of access for you and your health information.
  • We’ve made a start – WA has digitised parts of the Electronic Medical Records in WA’s hospitals, but this will see us take a bit leap forward. An EMR is all about the bedside workflows – this is where all the risk sits.
  • Patient portals can really assist with ensuring you have access to your EMR health information and can participate more actively in your own care.
  • The OpenNotes approach might be possible through WA’s EMR Project. (Google it. It’s very exciting!) This is quite aspirational though and may not be on the table, depending which vendor is chosen. OpenNotes will help clinicians think carefully about what they write about people, and will support the accuracy of information.

Importance of EMR Consumer Involvement

There are three levels of consumer input into training clinicians, and driving culture change:

1. Telling stories about what’s working, and what isn’t – this is effective with policy makers. Consumer stories are much more effective than clinicians providing feedback about what isn’t working for them as clinicians. Consumer stories can drive digital investment.

2. Co-designing solutions – so that the workflows centre around the patient, not the clinician. Information isn’t captured and shared for free. It always takes time and resources to share data.

3. Change management initiatives need consumers present, to make sure the tools are used in the way that helps consumers. Harry’s example of the test results not being available in the ED – it’s likely there is a portal that would allow the clinician access, but they don’t know how to use it. Consumers need to provide motivation for busy clinical staff to learn how to use the packages effectively.

Being a Digital Health Consumer/ Carer Rep:

  • You know more about digital health than you think you know.
  • You don’t need to understand every last technical detail – it’s important to ask naïve questions. This can prompt important critical thinking in digital health project.
  • There are no stupid questions – sharing your experience is more valuable than learning “geek language”  “Insist on answers in plain English. If the geeks can’t explain to you what they’re trying to do in plain English, then then you’ve probably got a program that’s not really set up for success anyway.”
  • We need to think of ourselves as allies with clinicians for change, working collaboratively together. “we’re not two different actors, trying to find common ground from across the chasm, we’re actually allies working towards a common goal.”

Feeling the need to geek out? All the federal initiatives for you to google are listed below:

There’s a change in the air that as if to say everyone recognises that we have an opportunity, probably a once in not just a single generation, but multi generation opportunity to fundamentally transform the way our health system works

Harry Iles Mann

Want to stay in touch with the project? Just fill in The EMR Consumer Network form or email p.brennan@hconc.org.au

Digital Health Series – Patient Portals

Posted on June 14, 2024

By Pip Brennan, Electronic Medical Record Consumer Reference Group Convenor

The Health Consumers’ Council was funded by the WA Health Electronic Medical Record (EMR) Program to convene three consumer webinars and four Consumer Reference Group meetings between January and June 2024. The purpose of this work is to build on the EMR Consumer Charter that was co-designed developed in 2021.

In this interim period prior to developing a tender for a statewide EMR, HCC aims to upskill a group of supported, networked consumers and empower us to deliberate on key aspects of the EMR. We have also created several videos on key topics. We are sharing the learnings from this work as widely as we can, as WA continues its progress towards obtaining EMR in around three years’ time.

Patient Portals – what do consumers need to know?

The Patient Portal is the part of an Electronic Medical Record that we can see and interact with.

It was the focus of the EMR Consumer Reference Group meeting in February 2024. Prior to the meeting, a list of patient portal resources were provided for the Group to look at:

At the meeting, we interviewed Liz Cashill and Consumer Representative Mary Oti from Royal Melbourne Hospital. They began implementing their patient portal in their EMR in 2020 and share key insights about what a patient portal is, how it works in practice, and what we need to think about as consumer representatives. You can watch the video replay below or read the transcript here.

WA’s Consumer priorities for a Patient Portal

After the presentation, the EMR Consumer Reference Group discussed our priorities for the future WA Health EMR Patient Portal. This is a summary which was provided to the WA Health EMR Program:

Consumer involvement: Consumers are partners throughout all stages of scoping, procurement, development and rollout of a patient portal.

Consumer centred: Base the design around us as consumers, as we move all across the system and want to be able to use one entry point for all our care. It must integrate and connect with adjunct and related systems; it needs to work in harmony with My Health Record. A priority for consumer centred care includes recording of preferred pronouns, name etc as part of the patient portal.

Consumer empowerment: The portal must support partnering with our health care team to achieve the best possible health outcomes. Specifically this includes two-way communication with an ability to view,  edit, download and print information about us. We need to be linked to knowledge and resources to navigate our care journey, with easy and intuitive navigation features.

Transparency, Choice and Control: this would look like there being controls for sharing of information need to be in place as they are for My Health Record, and understanding

Equity of access: we need to be supported to use the patient portal if we wish, but to receive the same standard of care if we don’t choose to use it. We would also like to see system flags to support equitable care,. e.g. when someone is travelling from the country. Other examples include a flag if there is a Disability Care Plan so staff are supported to provide safe care to someone who for example isn’t verbal. Flags to support trauma informed care are also key. A key consideration too is a patient portal available in languages other than English.

Proxy access is important with protections and permissions. For example, accessing health care for an adult child with a disability in the absence of guardianship –e.g. NDIS offer “common sense” choices – where people don’t need to get Guardianship to access their adult child’s records. We can sometimes have a bias towards the presumption of abuse e.g. in carers for people with disability, people who are frail aged.

Check the Digital Health page for the full series of webinars and information sessions on the WA Electronic Medical Record.

Reflections on the Digital Health Festival 2024

Posted on June 13, 2024

By Pip Brennan, Electronic Medical Record Consumer Reference Group Convenor

I was lucky enough to attend the Digital Health Festival 2024 in Melbourne, with WA consumer and health professional colleagues. The Health Consumers’ Council in WA negotiated to obtain three free consumer passes, and WA Health’s Electronic Medical Record (EMR) Program Team funded travel for myself and HCC Engagement Coordinator Kieran Bindahneem. We met Ricki Spencer in Melbourne, they are a member of the EMR Consumer Reference Group and split their time between WA and Victoria.

With eight concurrent streams and mostly 30-45 minute presentations, the Digital Health Festival was definitely overwhelming. Some of the concurrent presentations offered headphones, and these were by far the easiest presentations to stay focused in.

At the entrance was the stand where I took the opportunity to include a message about the importance of consumer involvement. #NothingAboutUsWithoutUs. It was not a common idea, and presentations mentioning co-design usually meant different health and government professionals collaborating. The wrap up report for the Digital Health Festival doesn’t mention the word “consumer” or “patient” anywhere – we sit somewhere in the “Other” category in the pie charts and tables. I have been approached to speak at the Digital Health Festival in 2025.

What has stayed with me

  • Dr Wonchul Cha’s keynote presentation about the Samsung Medical Centre in Korea, especially how the Patient Reported Outcomes surveys, which are integrated into their electronic medical record, achieve an 80%-90% response rate. They are a seamless part of the clinical appointment, and keep patient wellbeing right on top of the agenda.
  • Meeting up with consumer advocates including Mehmet Kavlakoglou, Harry Iles-Mann, and Ricky Spencer. Some quiet times talking outside the hub-bub of the Festival were restorative and insightful.
  • Talking to Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) staff and filling in a missing piece of the PROMS puzzle in my mind – how they need to be integrated into an EMR and used as part of care to get the return rate that really tracks patient outcomes (see Samsung example above).
  • Listening to a CSIRO presentation on the work they’re doing regarding consent processes and how to have ongoing consent facilitated when our data is used for research – consumers aren’t actively involved yet, but hoping they will be soon.
  • Panel discussion on how AI is supporting clinical decision making where one speaker suggested that over time, clinical trials may not be approved unless they have already gone through AI as this will reduce potential harm to patients.
  • I don’t need to feel total despair that each state and territory is doing its own thing regarding electronic medical records. Interoperability is still going to be technically possible. It is the number one consumer priority! The key challenges we have in relation to digital health are actually cultural – but the interoperability work at the federal level mandating interoperability is helpful.

 

Some reflections

  • What would it be like to have a consumer-co-led digital health festival with a focus on research translation, rather than research commercialisation? Some presentations were very sales-y.
  • Most states and territories have implemented their EMRs without significant or meaningful consultation with consumers, and even in some cases clinicians. Not so in WA! And after the conference the WA Budget announcement confirmed that WA will be funded for the next three years to develop a tender and appoint a supplier for WA’s EMR.
  • We have an EMR Consumer Charter in WA and a Consumer Reference Group working with the WA Health Team. We are upskilling ourselves and reflecting on what are key consumer priorities for an EMR. See our web page for all updates.

Opinion: It’s time for full transparency on who’s making money out of our healthcare

Posted on May 11, 2024

By Clare Mullen, Executive Director

So, there’s a few spats going on on social media at the moment in relation to health finance. Like on this post on LinkedIn where people representing surgeons, and people representing private health insurers, seem to me to be arguing about which one of them is going to charge the patient for the cost of surgical items.

So – it’s Saturday morning, and I have a bit of time, so I thought I’d try to see what some of these interests might be.

First up – the average salary of a surgeon

I couldn’t find any publicly funded sources of information from my quick search. But this article from Medrecruit (a medical recruitment firm) say they’ve used Australian Tax Office data to come up with an average taxable salary of $394,000 a year. The same company writes that neurosurgeons – like those who do spine surgery – can earn up to $800,000 a year.

So, between the 2023 article from Medrecruit, and a 2023 article from GlassDoor I feel comfortable reaching the conclusion that:

  • the average salary of a surgeon in Australia is around $340,000/year

Then to health insurer profits

The five biggest health insurance companies in Australia, according to the national consumer group Choice Australia are:

  • Medibank
  • Bupa
  • HCF
  • NIB
  • HBF

So I looked at the most recent annual reports (for 2023) for all of these companies. Some headlines:

  • Four of these five companies reported multi-million dollar profits last year – the exception is HBF who reported a loss of $87.7m, down from a loss last year too.
  • The average annual profit reported across the four was $344m/year.
  • Collectively, they reported profits of $1.3b.
  • Two of these five are set up as not-for-profit organisations – HCF (profit of $171.4m) and HBF

And so to the salaries of senior staff in health insurance firms…

I looked at what private health insurers pay their senior staff. (As a passing observation, if I didn’t know better I’d say that these firms don’t want you to work out what their senior staff get paid, because many of the reports make this information as opaque as possible. But I do know better. Except for HCF – they *really* don’t want you to know so they don’t publish it.)

Taking out HCF (because they don’t make that information available online), the average pay for the Chief Executive of the three other health insurance firms that reported a profit (or surplus) is $1.6m a year. Graph showing the comparison between the pays of health insurance CEOs, surgeons, and average earnings in Australia

As a comparison, the average for adult full-time earnings in Australia is $101,000/year. When you do a comparison that includes all earners (i.e. including those working part-time), the average annual salary is $74,500.

(And the CEO at HBF is reported as having been paid $731k to June 2023.)

So what?

So what does this mean? Is this just me whingeing about people who work hard to earn their money?

Nope. This is me trying to reconcile the reality of healthcare in this country. Where your socio-economic status determines your health, but where we’re seeing more outrage about which bit of the health system that’s making lots of money for the companies and people involved in providing that healthcare is going to pass on the cost of that healthcare to the people needing the healthcare.

It’s time for full transparency in health finances

As an informed health consumer, I find it really frustrating how challenging it is to find out about the financial interests in health. I want to know if the person or company providing me with care is doing it for my benefit, or for theirs.

This website from the Federal Government is a good start to find out about likely out of pocket costs for treatment you might be considering – https://medicalcostsfinder.health.gov.au/

And as someone who speaks regularly to people who are battling to get access to the healthcare they need – either having to overcome financial challenges, or grapple with bureaucratic processes that seem to have been designed by people who don’t give a fig about the people trying to access healthcare (which I know isn’t true!) – I want to see a much stronger voice for consumers and the community on this issue.

So let’s have full transparency on health finances. A few ideas off the top of my head on this Saturday morning:

  • If any healthcare provider receives any public funding (like Medicare), let’s require them to publish information about profits, and any individual salaries over the average annual salary
  • If any provider negotiates financial deals – like commission to preferred providers, or incentives for particular types of treatment – let’s require this to be published, and the information be made available to the consumer when they’re making a decision about treatment options
  • Along with the Choosing Wisely questions, let’s add a question about “What are the financial implications for you – the provider – in any of the options we’re discussing?”

 

 

Digital Health and the Electronic Medical Record – February 2024 Update

Posted on February 11, 2024

WA has been talking about getting an Electronic Medical Record for decades but to date, this has not exactly eventuated.

The first iteration of a digital record in our state came about when the Fiona Stanley Hospital was built in 2013. A newer version of this digital medical record has been in the process of being rolled out across our vast state since 2022. This has been done in preparation for a full Electronic Medical Record.

A project of this scale will require significant investment. During 2022-2023, a Business Case was developed and has now been submitted to treasury for consideration.

In 2021, HCC worked on a Consumer Charter for an Electronic Medical Record. If our state is successful in obtaining funding for the full Electronic Medical Record, there will still be a 10-year process to get a finalised version working in all our public hospitals. That means consumers will still be able to influence the design to ensure it meets our needs, as well as clinician and health system needs.

What do consumers think?

Consumer Involvement

HCC has been funded by WA Health to establish a Consumer Reference Group to help shape the project.

We will run three webinars between now and June 2024, and our Consumer Reference Group will meet four times within that period as well. We aim to build on the work of the Consumer Charter to provide considered feedback about our concerns and hopes for the key elements of an Electronic Medical Record.

We invite you to join us for the webinars; more details will be available soon and we will post the recordings online for those who can’t make it.

Connecting Across our Whole Health System

“Interoperability” – our information able to be accessed by ALL our care team.

An Electronic Medical Record is all your health information from within public hospital walls. Consumers have said they are interested in their private hospital specialists and GPs also being able to access important health information. Linking up residential and home-based aged care services has also been mentioned regularly. This is not the current focus of this program. Our role as consumer advocates is to link in with what is happening at a federal level with My Health Record. Ideally, we can help ensure the consumer ambition to have more integrated care is supported through digital innovations such as a patient portal that links up all our records.

Patient Portals

These are the public-facing part of an Electronic Medical Record – the part we will interact with. This is an area that we need to be able to influence the design of – seeing and changing appointments, being able to message the care team, etc. Continuing to link in with the federal developments of My Health Record will be a key consumer advocacy point.

Data Use, Privacy and Confidentiality

Connecting data across systems is currently very difficult. This makes it difficult for us to know if  health interventions are having the health outcomes we seek. An electronic medical record will generate data that could help us better understand the health outcomes being created through our health system. Meanwhile, My Health Record offers us the opportunity to lock down parts of our record, and know who has accessed our record, and we need to understand what might be possible in an Electronic Medical Record.

Patient Reported Outcome Measures and Patient Reported Experience Measures

Known as PROMS and PREMS and aiming to measure the patients’ views of their experiences and health, these measures are being developed in a piecemeal fashion in different areas of health and different parts of Australia (and the world). They will be part of the Electronic Medical Record and we need to be part of the conversation about what measures are used or developed.

Care Pathways – Sandwich or Biscuit?

Care pathways are informed by a number of factors, including evidence from clinical practice, research, and service improvement projects. These are a description of the best evidence informed care that consumers can expect. They are not meant to de-personalise care, rather care pathways are “guard rails” to support safe and high-quality care. These too will be encoded into the My Health Record and will require a coming together across WA’s public health system to agree on these. For example, if you are receiving diabetic care and experience low blood sugar in one part of the health system, you may be offered a sandwich. If you are in another part of the health system you may be offered a biscuit. How these are harmonised and developed across the state requires consumer input.

 

Pip Brennan, Consumer Consultant, February 2024