The latest news from the Digital Health CRC
June, 2023
Message from our CEO
Annette Schmiede
Welcome to our June Newsletter. As we approach the end of the financial year, we can report that our Research and Development Program is tracking towards $40 million of funds committed. There are 40 projects in delivery and 17 completed. We have close to 20 projects in development which we expect to see in delivery before the end of the year. This has been a herculean effort across the whole organisation under the leadership of the Director of Research Dr Clare Morgan.
The Federal Budget last month included significant funding for digital health and Medicare reform. I was fortunate to attend Health Minister Butler’s Press Club speech the week before the Budget where he previewed this funding and the Government priorities in health.
There were a number of important commitments for digital health to secure the future and improvement of My Health Record through ongoing funding of the Australian Digital Health Agency. We are expecting policy announcements to support the development of interoperability and development of national standards. There was also a commitment to modernise Medicare with the introduction of MyMedicare to better connect health data to help doctors, nurses and primary care providers to deliver better continuity of care for patients.
In total, the Federal Government committed over $800 million to digital health, which it says will give “health professionals the digital and data tools needed to provide improved and more co‑ordinated care.”
There was also good news for our SME partners with the announcement of the $392 million Industry Growth Program to provide targeted funding to SMEs and startups to commercialise ideas and grow their business. Projects in the priority areas of the $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund, which includes medical science, will be eligible for the Industry Growth Program.
We are proud to work with a broad spectrum of innovative SMEs who are making a tangible impact on digital health both here in Australia and globally. In this edition you’ll find a profile of once such partner with Alcidion CEO Kate Quirke sharing your views on the opportunities and challenges for digital health today.
We were also pleased to partner with Alcidion and Alfred Health at Digital Health Festival in Melbourne last week. Check out the photos below. On our exhibition stand we also shared copies of our recent paper Digital Transformation Of Healthcare In Australia Constrained - A Call To Action For A National Data Governance Framework to delegates and there certainly was an air of expectation throughout the event that we are finally going to see national policy leadership to drive interoperability and national standards. We continue to actively advocate for such standards.
Next up for the DHCRC is MEDINFO23 in Sydney. It will be exciting to see this global event hosted in Australia. We’re planning to host a very special breakfast event – see further detail on this below. I look forward to seeing many of you at this event, if not before.
Warm regards,
Annette Schmiede
CEO, Digital Health CRC
Latest News
DHCRC Event: Prioritising Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voices in digital health design
DHCRC will host a flagship event at MEDINFO23, presenting a unique and important opportunity to hear from first-hand, prominent Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander digital health leaders.
Co-design is key to successful digital health initiatives. Yet, this term is frequently used as a mere token, with projects failing to meaningfully engage those with lived experiences.
In this exclusive gathering, DHCRC is looking to turn up the volume on this issue. A panel of community representatives will share their lived experiences and perspectives on the need for co-design and inclusivity for all communities in all ways.
This event has limited capacity but if you would like to join this discussion, email info@dhcrc.com
DHCRC showcases partners at Digital Health Festival 2023
We were pleased to showcase our work with Alfred Health and Alcidion at the Digital Health Festival held in Melbourne earlier this month. Our stand offered delegates a first-hand look at Alcidion’s Miya Flow patient journey boards which are currently in use at Alfred Health’s three hospital sites throughout Victoria.
DHCRC is currently working with Monash University, Alcidion and Alfred Health to review the impact and effectiveness of these patient journey boards for both clinicians and patients.
DHCRC Chief Innovation Officer, Dr. Stefan Harrer, also chaired a panel discussion on the hot topic of ethics, AI and healthcare. The panel, which included President of Mayo Clinic Platform and Founder of the Coalition of Health, John Halamka, and Max Kelsen Co-Founder and CEO, Nicholas Therkelsen-Therry, discussed how to responsibly design, develop and use generative AI in healthcare and medicine.
The panel followed the publication of this peer-reviewed study in The Lancet’s eBioMedicine journal in which Stefan Harrer proposes, for the first time, a comprehensive ethical framework for the responsible use, design, and governance of Generative AI applications in healthcare and medicine.
In conversation with… Alcidion CEO Kate Quirke
Kate Quirke has been in and around digital health for over three decades. Kate shares her views on the changes, challenges and opportunities facing healthcare today.
Tell us how the digital health sector has changed over the years?
I have been working in digital health for over three decades. In that time we have seen significant changes in both the implementation of digital technologies and also the different areas of focus within digital health.
When I started out, digital health was very much centred on administrative systems, focusing on more efficiently managing processes, and it was very much hospital focused. This transitioned to a focus to developing electronic medical records - moving from paper to digital. From here, there was a real effort to broaden this beyond just the hospital sector and linking this to primary healthcare and with an increased emphasis on the patient. COVID-19 then hit and, as we know, it fundamentally changed digital health, we saw the creation of new models of care – such as virtual care and telehealth.
Education Update
DHCRC microlearning program launched: free pilot program now open
The DHCRC has developed two telehealth microlearning modules in partnership with Western Australia Country Health Service, La Trobe University, Curtin University, Advanced Personnel Management and Obvious Choice.
DHCRC will be piloting and evaluating the microlearning modules in July 2023, which have been developed to support nursing and allied health professionals increase capability and confidence in telehealth delivery.
The format helps participants develop a 'little and often' continuous learning habit by engaging them in a few minutes learning via a mobile phone app each day. The two modules stack together into a learning pathway that takes four weeks to master.
Register your interest to take part in this free pilot program here
A step towards using smartwatches in healthcare
DHCRC PhD Candidate Dr Graeme Mattison has shared a snapshot of his recently published roadmap for the integration of smart watches into Australian healthcare on the DHCRC Big Thinkers Forum.
With one in three Australians owning a smartwatch, they have significant potential to enable personalised care for those diagnosed with diseases including obesity, diabetes and arthritis.
Published in The Medical Journal of Australia, the paper outlines the opportunity to integrate smart watches into the Australian healthcare system but acknowledges the challenges – building digital health prevention foundations; transforming preventive care using data and analytics; and harnessing learning systems to enable precise disease prevention.
Cindy Wills
Belle Hart
DHCRC interns on show
BodyGuide, a preventative digital health platform that empowers employees to take control of their physical wellbeing, has unveiled a new pilot program with global construction firm Multiplex.
DHCRC, in partnership with La Trobe University, sponsored two professional interns – Cindy Wills and Belle Hart – to develop evidence-based research on the benefits of the BodyGuide platform in delivering pain prevention and management to users.
Cindy, who has a digital health background, and Belle, a working pharmacist, created a best-practice evaluation framework to measure patient outcomes – a significant challenge for preventative health innovations.
On reflection of the internship Cindy said: “Internships are so important as they bridge the gap between industry and research. For me personally, this provided the opportunity to develop a greater understanding of what academic research is available in the digital health space and more interestingly what isn’t there.”
Belle added: “This DHCRC sponsored internship gave a taste of what a career in digital health looks like. It was particularly rewarding being able to help create a unique tool that will help demonstrate the impact BodyGuide can offer in practice.”
Register now for this conversation starter
The DHCRC is proud to champion conversations that explore how to support the participation of all women in the workplace. This upcoming event, to be hosted at Amazon's Sydney offices, presents a teaser for a soon-to-be announced pilot project with digital health startup Metluma, Western Sydney University and other collaborators. Join us to start a conversation on how an integrated model of care can build health literacy to better support women experiencing menopause in the workplace.
Read more and register to Press (meno)Pause: Let’s start the conversation
Project Update
Florence to flourish patient’s digital health experiences
A new project unveiled this month will look to address the ever-growing challenge of increasing wait times for specialist medical appointments.
DHCRC, with Sydney Local Health District (the District) and researchers from the University of Sydney, will undertake a research project aimed at expanding the utilisation of technology developed by the District and digital health technology specialists at Five Faces.
Florence is a digital patient appointment management and engagement platform that was established in the District during the COVID-19 pandemic to streamline patient management and delivery of COVID-19 vaccinations. It has since evolved to meet outpatient needs and is currently being rolled out District-wide.
This research project will evaluate the impact of Florence on patient experience and explore opportunities to use the technology to improve healthcare delivery more broadly, with a targeted focus on Culturally Linguistic and Diverse (CALD) populations and older Australians to ensure healthcare delivery is improved for all.
Upcoming Events
MedInfo23
Date: 8-12 July 2023
Location: ICC, Sydney
MedInfo 2023 – the 19th world congress on medical and health – is presented by the Australasian Institute of Digital Health (AIDH) on behalf of the International Medical Informatics Association (IMIA). This international event brings together thousands of digital health leaders and practitioners at the forefront of healthcare and is considered a landmark event on the global calendar.
The event theme - THE FUTURE IS ACCESSIBLE – aims to inspire us to collectively build a health sector that is accessible, where data is not locked in silos and where both clinicians and consumers can work together in true partnership towards healthier lives, digitally enabled.
OHDSI 2023 APAC Symposium
Date: 13-14 July 2023
Location: University of Sydney
OHDSI’s mission is to improve health by empowering a community to collaboratively generate evidence that promotes better health decisions and better care. OHDSI has established a global community of observational health researchers and a research network covering over 810 million patients.
The 2023 APAC Symposium provides an opportunity for our Asia-Pacific collaborators to share research, updates, and network. Topics to be covered include: observational data standards and management, methodological research, open-source analytics development, clinical research from OHDSI’s analytic use cases – clinical characterization, population-level estimation, patient-level prediction – and community development.
