Good Practice

Issue 7 | July 2014 Properly identifying Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander patients has a number of benefits for doctors and patients, the evidence shows a minority of mainstream practice throughout Australia conduct routine identification processes for all patients. While there are a number of reasons GPs don’t make identification an everyday party of their practice, the RACGP’s Identification of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Australian general practice provides information and suggestions about the best ways to go about asking the question.

Melbourne GP Dr Sue English has been working to help children in East Timor for more than a decade and when she met a young girl in need of spinal surgery, she embarked on a two-year journey to bring her to Australia so she could access quality radiology and life-changing surgery.

The National Asthma Council Australia’s Australian Asthma Handbook still plays a significant role in helping people with asthma. The latest version has a number of new additions, but one of the most significant is the fact it is now available as an interactive online resource, to healthcare professionals can access the specific information they are after immediately.

Sydney’s Dr Dasha Fielder started her medical training with the desire to work in obstetrics and gynecology. But her decision to move into general practice, where she is free to provide her patients with a broad range of services in addition to family medicine, is one she has never looked back on.

Following the revelation that a number of their patients had experienced adverse effects after receiving vaccinations, staff as Perth’s Illawarra Medical Centre helped develop a new user-friendly system that makes it easier for people to report such undesirable reactions.