Adj Prof Jackie Hanson, Chief Executive
Voice Referendum poster
Tomorrow is 1 July, which means it’s the first day we could receive our 24 hour notification for short notice accreditation assessment.
NAIDOC Week starts this weekend, from Sunday 2 July to Sunday 9 July. I will be holding a vidcast on Wednesday with ED Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Sherry Holzapfel and Edward Monaei from the Department of Seniors, Disability Services and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships. There will also be a range of events happening across Metro North facilities. As part of the NAIDOC Week celebrations, Australian Unity is inviting staff to attend the Food on Fourth event in the Herston Quarter heritage precinct. Food trucks will be onsite and there will be entertainment with a musician on Thursday 6 July (11am-2pm).
There’s been a lot of media about the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to Parliament and the referendum later this year. In my conversations with people, there’s some confusion about the Voice and how it would work. You can find out more about the Voice and the referendum at Voice.gov.au (or click the image).
This week I received a copy of the Australian Centre for Health Services Innovation’s (AusHSI) new toolkit to help with identifying and addressing low value care. Around 30 per cent of healthcare globally may be of little or no value to patients. The toolkit is a free resource to help clinicians and managers with support to identify, quantify
and foster change for low value care in hospitals.
Oral Health Alliance
We are currently going through an organisational change process which will move governance of the Oral Health Alliance from Community and Oral Health over to the STARS directorate. Last year we undertook an operational governance review of the OHA which recommended this realignment. STARS already has an education and research alliance with The University of Queensland.
This realignment is proposed to commence 10 July. We are currently recruiting for a new Oral Health Alliance Director who will report to the ED STARS.
Infrastructure update
Last week, the Queensland Government announced that tenders have been awarded for The Prince Charles Hospital and Redcliffe Hospital expansions which will increase our health capacity. Hutchinson Builders will lead the detailed design of the $360 million Prince Charles Hospital Expansion and Multiplex Constructions will lead the detailed design of the $1.148 billion Redcliffe Hospital. These projects will be managed by Health Capital Division with Metro North responsible for commissioning and operations. Consultation with clinicians, functional areas and stakeholders will contribute to the initial design phase of the facilities and will commence over the next few months.
Construction of a new 1500 space multi-storey car park is about to get underway at The Prince Charles Hospital. Multiplex will start to establish their construction site from early July in preparation of construction. The car park will provide more parking for patients, staff and visitors and will support the further expansion of The Prince Charles Hospital.
This week, Australian Unity and Hutchinson Builders held a Smoking Ceremony at the Northern Car Park construction site at Herston to bless the slab where the works will continue.
You might have seen Ty featured on our social media this week. Ty is a proud Mununjali and Undambi man working in a health worker role to achieve better health outcomes and better access to health services for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander individuals, families, and communities at Caboolture Hospital.
After nursing for nearly 10 years, Ty has recently made the switch to health care worker, and now plays a significant role in meeting the health needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, by working collaboratively with a range of clinical health practitioners within multi professional teams to provide clinical and non-clinical comprehensive primary health care services.
The new Caboolture Satellite Hospital is due to open its doors in August, and we have some identified positions for Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people currently being advertised.
CE leave
I will be taking a month’s leave from 17 July. Jane Hancock will be acting CE during that period.
Kind regards,
Jackie.