AFTER
comprehensive market testing, Mayne Health has been identified
as the preferred tenderer to provide health services in Victoria
to the Australian Defence Force.
Referring
to the length of time taken to negotiate a contract for health
services in Victoria, Director-General Defence Health Service
Air Commodore Tony Austin said, “It is a matter of making
sure that the stakeholders and the base commanders are happy with
the level of service that is proposed through the contract: scoping
of the total service that will be offered by the contractor and
ensuring that the service will adequately meet the needs of the
base.”
The
delivery of the world’s best practice health care and service
and the duty of care owed to ADF personnel are paramount to the
Defence Health Service (DHS).
However,
AIRCDRE Austin said that in an environment where the pool from
which to draw professional and highly trained Defence health personnel
was diminishing, difficult decisions needed to be made and reassessment
of priorities were often required.
“One
of my problems is that, where I have a very small number of uniformed
providers on a facility, it becomes very difficult to release
them for military focused training,” he said
“I
can give an example of a doctor who may be working in a garrison
situation, providing primary health care as a GP, but whose deployment
role may be to run a resuscitation facility where they are dealing
with multi-trauma victims.”
While
the imperative remained the delivery of world-class, quality health
care to all ADF personnel, during both peacetime and heightened
operational tempo, the reality was that in less critical areas
the provider of that care could not always be a uniformed member
of the Defence Health Service, he said.
“Clearly
there is a skill mismatch between what they are doing in peacetime
and what I expect of them in war,” AIRCDRE Austin said.
“Bringing
those people together into a smaller number of larger ADF health
facilities actually facilitates their training and my ability
to release them into the civilian sector to achieve the skills
I want of them.”
DHS,
as a direct contributor to ADF operational capability, has an
obligation to ensure all its personnel have the necessary skills
and training to ensure its personnel develop and maintain individual
readiness. This experience and exposure cannot be obtained by
ADF health personnel through their general day-to-day clinical
and medical practices.
“As
a consequence ... we have developed strategic alliances with certain
civilian health facilities where I can place doctors, nurses and
medics to get those skills,” AIRCDRE Austin said.
“It
is very difficult, if not impossible, for me to do that when I
have such a small number of people spread across a large number
of bases.”
