Australian Institute of Health Policy Studies (AIHPS) - News Archive

National News

Scarcity of doctors will dog Labor's Super Clinics - 29 September, 2007
Workforce pressures mean Labor's proposed network of GP Super Clinics are unlikely to be fully staffed until increased medical student places mature into increased numbers of newly graduating doctors...More

Abbott dental scheme 'designed to fail' - 24 September, 2007
A new $385 million Howard government program to provide dental care for the chronically ill under Medicare...More

Call for privacy must be balance with your health carer's need to know - 22 September, 2007
Many people approach the privacy of their health information in the same way they approach works fo art...More

Infrastructure is sexy, but prevention would do greater good - 22 September, 2007
The Government's recent announcement that $2.5 billion of the $17billion surplus will go to health is welcome recognition that escalating health costs and community expectations demand additional funding from all governments...More

Right time for rural crisis focus - 15 September, 2007
The looming federal poll is being seen as the best chance for years to secure pledges from the main parties to fix rural health...More

At last we have a vision for a better and fairer health system - 15 September, 2007
National policy-makers and politicians are slow to act when it comes to big national public policy decisions. Careful consideration is naturally prudent when major changes are required...More

Medicare for mental health displaces counsellors - 15 September, 2007
Counsellors throughout Australia have experienced a significant decline in demand for services since the Government introduced funding for GPs to refer patients to psychologists...More

Rising fees force those in need to shun medical care - 10 September, 2007
One in four Australians have decided not to go to the doctor or hospital in the past three years because of the cost, with women, renters and those on low to middle incomes most likely to be deterred...More

Remedy for rural docs - 10 September, 2007
Doctors have turned up their noses at lucrative taxpayer-funded incentives to attract them to work in rural and regional areas, and are instead remaining in cities...More

State's shifting health costs to Canberra - 10 September, 2007
Patients wanting to see a doctor sooner and obtain the most effective drugs are being used by state governments to shift costs to the commonwealth, in a sign the principle of universal healthcare may be corroding the system...More

Microsoft predicts 'health revolution' - 7 September, 2007
Microsoft's research chief Craig Mundie has signalled a "revolution" in health care, underpinned by a massive increase in computing power...More

Rudd's health plan unconvincing, but its worthy of support - 1 September, 2007
Comment: The $2 billion plan for health care released by Kevin Rudd's Labor opposition last Thursday trumps Prime Minister John Howard's proposed $45 million bail-out of the Mersey Hospital in Devonport, Tasmania, by $1.955 billion of your hard-earned taxes...More

Dental plan to ignore special needs patients - 1 September, 2007
Chronically ill patients could miss out on federally subsidised dental care if they are too sick to sit in a dentist's chair, a parliamentary inquiry has been told...More

Doctor's fear super-clinics detrimental to the bush - 1 September, 2007
Labor's plan to spend $220 million to establish GP super-clinics could attract doctors away from rural towns that already lack medical services...More

State News

Queensland rolls out surgical deaths audit - 7 September, 2007
Queensland, the former home of Jayant Patel and a string of health controversies, has become the latest state to sign up to a Royal Australasian College of Surgeons program to audit surgical deaths...More

Sydney unprepared for terror attack - 4 September, 2007
If a London-style terrorist attack were to occur in the Sydney CBD on any normal working day, the emergency medical system simply would not cope...More

Hospital bans obese and smoker - 3 September, 2007
Adelaide's Queen Elizabeth Hospital is refusing to perform certain major surgery on anyone who is obese or a smoker...More

International News

U.S health care improves, but costs too much: report - 25 September, 2007
The quality of health care in the United States is steadily improving, with more patients getting recommended treatments, but there are a few notable gaps...More

Scottish obesity 'just behind US' - 25 September, 2007
Obesity levels in Scotland are the second highest in the developed world behind the USA, new statistics have revealed...More

Literacy can be a matter of life and death - 25 September, 2007
Millions can't process health data...More

Health care premiums expected to jump 8.7% in 2008, study says - 24 September, 2007
Health care premiums of employers and their workers rose by more than twice the rate of inflation in 2007...More

PM driven by own NHS experience - 24 September, 2007
Gordon Brown has used his own experience of the NHS when he almost lost his sight to explain why he is a strong believer in the health service...More

The battle over wellness - 24 September, 2007
Despite Rudy Giuliani's espousal of the US healthcare system over the UK's there are some who differ...More

NHS rationing rife, say doctors - 24 September, 2007
Rationing of NHS treatments is becoming more widespread, a survey of GPs and hospital doctors suggest...More

Lifestyle disease deaths may double by 2015, WHO warns - 14 September, 2007
World deaths from "lifestyle" disease will double by 2015 unless all-out efforts are taken to combat them, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned Friday...More

San Francisco to offer care for uninsured adults - 14 September, 2007
A new program has been set up that offers free or subsized health care to all 82,000 San Francisco adults without insurance...More

Statisticians boost effort to block children's health-insurance expansion - 13 September, 2007
In its effort to stop Congress from expanding a public health insurance program for low-income children the Bush administration has hit on a compelling argument: the obscure but inevitable phenomenon know as "crowd out"...More

Report: Number of U.S. deaths up in 2005 - 13 September, 2007
The number of deaths in the United States rose in 2005 after a sharp decline the year earlier, a disappointing reversal that suggests the 2004 numbers were a fluke. Cancer deaths were also up...More

Residents may need training in interpreting statistics - 10 September, 2007
Most internal medicine residents have difficulty interpreting statistics in medical journals, potentially reducing the quality of care they offer their patients...More

Opening a fast lane to get data on patients - 10 September, 2007
The program is touted as a way to reduce paperwork and duplicate tests, but critics worry about privacy issues...More

Some companies penalize for helath risks - 9 September, 2007
Now companies are penalizing workers who have high health risks such as obesity and high blood pressure or cholesterol as insurance costs climb...More

A drug makers views on what ails health care- 8 September, 2007
Daniel L. Vasella, chief executive of Novartis, the $39 billion pharmaceutical giant based in Switzerland, says that even though Americans have made progress in curing some diseases, they face a major increase in obesity- and aging-related diseases...More

New York City puts hospital error data online - 7 September, 2007
The New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation, the nation's largest public health system, plans to begin releasing data today on infection and death rates at its 11 hospitals in reponse to widespread concern about deadly, preventable and costly hospital-acquired conditions and pressure to crack open the shrouded culture of many hospitals...More

Putting pay on the line to improve health care - 4 September, 2007
Every quarter I get together with my partners to review the performance of our medical practice. Like a manager of a car dealership, I bring out the numbers. I show them how many patients we saw in the previous months, what we billed, how much we collected...More

Why are parents in denial about kids weight? - 3 September, 2007
Experts in childhood nutrition aren't surprised by a poll this summer that shows 50% of parents who have overweight or obese children don't realize their children weigh too much...More

Doctors offering no-interest loans to patients - 30 August, 2007
Zero-interest financing, a familiar sales incentive at car dealerships and furniture stores, has found its way to another big-ticket consumer market; doctor's and dentist's offices...More

Census Income report feeds health-care debate - 29 August, 2007
Washington - Five years into an economics recovery, the benefits of growth are finally flitering down to some of the poorest Americans and the income of the typical family is climbing...More

AMA launches healthcare campaign - 24 August, 2007
LA - The association pitches its plan - using tax credits or voucehers to help buy coverage - to voters and candidates...More

WHO ties rising populaton, new diseases - 23 August, 2007
Geneva - a ballooning world population, intensive farming practices and changes in sexual behavior have provided a breeding ground for an unprecedented number of emerging diseases, the U.N. health agency said Thursday...More

1 million N.Y.ers have no health insurance - 23 August, 2007
A sickening 1 million New Yorkers don't have health insurance, even though 700,000 of them have jobs, according to a report released yesterday by the city Health Department...More

Other News & Reports

Success stories in Indigenous health
Australians for Native Title and Reconciliation report...More