Personal protective equipment

Personal protective equipment

PPE should be used in accordance with existing guidance for standard and transmission-based precautions, as specified in the Australian guidelines for the prevention and control of infection in healthcare.

Optimising the use of personal protective equipment

One of the key issues facing general practice during the COVID-19 pandemic was the availability of PPE. This fact sheet provides recommendations to help optimise the use of PPE in your winter preparedness planning to ensure your own, your patients’ and the general practice team’s safety.

Strategies include:

• undertaking telehealth consultations
• referring patients with respiratory symptoms to local GP-led respiratory clinics.
• wearing masks for all consultations and encouraging all adults to wear a mask upon entering your facility.

Ordering PPE

You must have equipment that enables your practice to provide comprehensive primary care while minimising transmission between staff.

A national distributor has been engaged to deliver supplies directly to general practices, rather than via PHNs, to better streamline distribution of PPE. 

General Practice PPE Order Forms are available via your PHN, who will continue to be your point of contact for submitting orders.

The Department of Health has published information on the new process, which also outlines the eligibility criteria for accessing the different PPE bundles. These bundles include the supply of pulse oximeters to practices.  These bundles include the supply of pulse oximeters to practices, including the Sa02 monitor which can be used to guide GPs in their decision making while caring for unwell COVID-19 patients.