Australian journal of primary health
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The Rural Research Capacity Building Program commenced in 2006 with the aim of developing research skills in rural health workers. The program was based on the capacity building principles of workforce development, organisational development, resource allocation, partnership and leadership. Qualitative methods were used to assess capacity building outcomes. ⋯ The leadership shown and partnerships developed by the program managers enhanced the workforce development and organisational change outcomes. Resources, such as backfill and incidentals, were useful for candidates, but practicalities, such as availability of replacement staff, limited effectiveness. This study showed the value of using a capacity building framework and demonstrated that undertaking research on a topic close to practice positioned candidates to drive change within their organisation.
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The Australian general practitioner (GP) workforce, especially younger generation GPs and female GPs, increasingly prioritises work-life balance (WLB). Good WLB is associated with decreased interest of medical students in general practice as a speciality choice as well as good health and wellbeing, and decisions of GPs to retire early. Therefore, understanding the role played by different factors in achieving WLB is crucial to ensure a sufficient GP workforce necessary to meet the rising demands of health care. ⋯ Several factors relating to family and social circumstances were not significantly associated with WLB of GPs in this study. Only half of the GP workforce reported good WLB. Flexibility of work hours, opportunities for leisure activities and good health of GPs have the potential to enhance the WLB and hence promote greater GP participation in the workforce.
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Chronic diseases require a multidisciplinary approach to provide patients with optimal care in general practice. This often involves general practitioners (GPs) referring their patients to allied health professionals (AHPs). The Team-link study explored the impact of an intervention to enhance working relationships between GPs and AHPs in general practice regarding the management of two chronic diseases: diabetes and ischaemic heart disease (IHD) or hypertension. ⋯ There were no changes in AHP measure. This study demonstrates that the instrument is sensitive to differences between providers and conditions and is sensitive to change over time following an intervention. There were few associations with the other measures suggesting that the MoML might assess other aspects of teamwork involving practitioners who are not collocated or in the same organisation.
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This article reports a qualitative study investigating patients' experiences of ongoing smoking or smoking cessation after hospitalisation for an acute coronary syndrome (myocardial infarction or unstable angina) and describes how study participants spoke about the role of their doctors in smoking cessation. We invited individuals who had been admitted to an Australian public hospital in 2005 with a discharge diagnosis of an acute cardiac syndrome and who were smokers at the time of their hospitalisation to participate. ⋯ Findings gave insight into the ways that cardiac patients perceive smoking cessation advice from their doctors, the perceived stigma of smoking and how lay understandings about smoking and smoking cessation emphasise the role of choice and individual responsibility. Our findings also indicate considerable scope for GPs and other doctors to offer better smoking cessation support to patients with established cardiovascular disease, particularly after a period of hospitalisation when the majority are highly motivated to stop smoking.
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Multicenter Study
Dementia: opportunities for risk reduction and early detection in general practice.
This project aimed to measure general practitioner (GP), practice nurse and patient health literacy about memory problems, dementia and its risk factors. Data were collected from general practices across Australia and a smaller sample in England. Questionnaires explored sources and adequacy of dementia knowledge and a randomised controlled trial tested the intervention of a dementia risk reduction pamphlet on patient knowledge of dementia risk reduction strategies. ⋯ The frequency of documentation of Mini-Mental State Examination and dementia diagnosis in computerised medical records of patients over 75 years was less than 0.01. These results demonstrate that many adult patients attending GPs have memory concerns, associate dementia with memory loss, and are receptive to information about dementia risk reduction. Most general practitioners and their nurses rate their dementia knowledge as inadequate with few testing for memory problems or discussing dementia with their patients.