Gippsland PHN Nurse Clinic Project

Applications are open: Apply here

Supporting Establishment of Nurse Led Clinics for Risk Prevention Project

Gippsland has experienced drought, bushfire and pandemic in 2019-2020. Gippsland Primary Health Network (Gippsland PHN) worked to support the community’s health and wellbeing through practical and innovative initiatives.

Recognising ongoing community needs, Gippsland PHN engaged APNA in January 2021 to support the establishment of up to 3 nurse clinics to support improved provision of evidenced based, risk prevention, health assessment and screening care for the community. For the purposes of this project, applications are open to general practices employing 1 or more nurses in the Gippsland PHN Latrobe catchment area, interested in establishing a Nurse Clinic.

This project focuses on optimising utilisation of a nurse delivered, team based models of care (Nurse Clinic) to identify patients at risk of developing chronic disease(s) in conjunction with validated screening tools (where available), either self-administered or administered in conjunction with the general practice nurse, to facilitate access to preventive strategies related to chronic disease.

Overarching Objectives

• To improve identification of people at risk of developing chronic disease and enable early detection of chronic conditions utilising the primary health care nursing workforce, helping to reduce the likelihood of chronic disease developing and to enable improved care if diagnosed.
• To improve the provision of evidenced based health assessment and screening care to the community in order to reduce the likelihood of chronic disease and to enable better management of chronic disease.

Aim of the Program

• Build the capacity of the primary health care nursing workforce to optimise risk prevention activities in clinical practice.   
• Improve team-based approaches to primary health care service delivery through nurse delivered (team based) models of care.
• Support nurses working in primary health care settings to build the knowledge and skills to deliver best practice clinical services in relevant priority areas of primary health care.
• Improve access to opportunistic screening and early intervention services for identified priorities areas.
• Promote, and increase the use of, existing primary care systems to assist healthcare providers to identify clients eligible for screening, and support targeted health promotion strategies to encourage community participation in available health screening.

Key Dates

Contact

Jo Millard: Project Officer

jo.millard@apna.asn.au or 1300 303 184