will add in a few points of further clarity to the overview of the Australian health care system (I'm in metropolitan Australia) - the second private health system (the supplemental system) which one personally pays for access to (via insurance) and like car insurance if you then need to use it there is an excess fee (a further out of pocket) but it gets access to more rapid care for some elective type procedures when compared to the public system (think elective joint replacements, cardiac cath) but if you are really sick the public system is going to treat you just as quick. Most private hospitals also don't have intensive care support. - the excess fee described is in the order of $500 - 1000 per hospitalisation (in general) - the electronic record system that Cedric is asking about (and Justin appears to not elaborate much on - I think he misinterpreted the question as his response was more around how medicare cards work) is called the "my health record". It documents vaccination history (derived from another registry database), recent tests and discharge summaries (in the past year), list of medications and allergies. Unfortunately it is only as good as the information that goes into it - and from where I sit many hospital discharge summaries fail to get uploaded for unclear reasons (my money is on human factors - someone just doesn't hit the upload key - so I still have to call hospitals to get faxed summaries) - and the medication one doesn't seem to update well (the part where it indicates last script fill doesn't reliably update, again likely human factors). Some people also put access codes on their MHR for privacy reasons and some others have opted out of having one altogether. That said despite its limitations it is better than nothing - we also have a real time opiate/ drugs of abuse prescription monitoring system (you enter a patients name and DOB and it will give a list of schedule 8 prescriptions and some antipsychotics which are commonly misused - eg quetiapine) - access to primary care is more difficult since the pandemic (often waiting 2 weeks in some metropolitan areas, and much worse in rural)
To join the conversation, you need to subscribe.
Sign up today for full access to all episodes and to join the conversation.
To earn CME for this chapter, you need to subscribe.
Sign up today for full access to all episodes and earn CME.
Melinda N. - August 8, 2022 5:05 PM
no we do not pronounce R
Shu-Haur O. - August 11, 2022 5:22 PM
will add in a few points of further clarity to the overview of the Australian health care system (I'm in metropolitan Australia)
- the second private health system (the supplemental system) which one personally pays for access to (via insurance) and like car insurance if you then need to use it there is an excess fee (a further out of pocket) but it gets access to more rapid care for some elective type procedures when compared to the public system (think elective joint replacements, cardiac cath) but if you are really sick the public system is going to treat you just as quick. Most private hospitals also don't have intensive care support.
- the excess fee described is in the order of $500 - 1000 per hospitalisation (in general)
- the electronic record system that Cedric is asking about (and Justin appears to not elaborate much on - I think he misinterpreted the question as his response was more around how medicare cards work) is called the "my health record". It documents vaccination history (derived from another registry database), recent tests and discharge summaries (in the past year), list of medications and allergies. Unfortunately it is only as good as the information that goes into it - and from where I sit many hospital discharge summaries fail to get uploaded for unclear reasons (my money is on human factors - someone just doesn't hit the upload key - so I still have to call hospitals to get faxed summaries) - and the medication one doesn't seem to update well (the part where it indicates last script fill doesn't reliably update, again likely human factors). Some people also put access codes on their MHR for privacy reasons and some others have opted out of having one altogether. That said despite its limitations it is better than nothing
- we also have a real time opiate/ drugs of abuse prescription monitoring system (you enter a patients name and DOB and it will give a list of schedule 8 prescriptions and some antipsychotics which are commonly misused - eg quetiapine)
- access to primary care is more difficult since the pandemic (often waiting 2 weeks in some metropolitan areas, and much worse in rural)