Health Consumers Queensland has conducted several rounds of consultation in partnership with external organisations, including CheckUp, Darling Downs West Moreton PHN and the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care.
Rural, regional and remote access to healthcare
CheckUp engaged us to consult with First Nations and non-indigenous rural, remote and regional consumers on their health care experiences to inform future service planning. Using the Kitchen Table Discussion and Yarning Circle methods, our First Nations Consultant, Cas Nest, supported the gathering of consumer views from across Queensland, as far north as Ravenshoe, out west to Boulia and down south in Kingaroy and Cherbourg. 62 consumers shared their thoughts across seven consultations.
Cas presented the key findings from the report Not a postcode lottery: What Queensland First Nations and non- indigenous rural, remote & regional consumers want from their healthcare in 2023 in the keynote address at CheckUp’s 2023 Outreach Forum with one of the consumer hosts, Karen Metcalfe from Charters Towers. Together HCQ and CheckUp have produced an engaging summary of the key findings and recommendations. The summary is available to view here.
The rural and remote consumer voices were amplified further when Cas presented at the 3rd Queensland Clinical Networks Symposium: ‘Strengthening quality and safety in modern healthcare systems’ on Friday 6 October 2023.
Talk About in Darling Downs West Moreton
Since 2020, HCQ has supported the Darling Downs West Moreton PHN’s TALK ABOUT community engagement campaign by facilitating consultations to hear from a diversity of health consumer voices across the region. Through HCQ’s unique, consumer-led kitchen table discussion methodology we have facilitated 11 rounds of consultation topics for the PHN to date, hearing the voices of 442 consumers. You can read more about the project here. We recently heard the exciting news that the TALK ABOUT project is a finalist in the IAP2 Core Values Awards! These awards recognise outstanding projects and organisations at the forefront of community engagement. The nomination is well-deserved: throughout the TALK ABOUT project, the PHN has shown its absolute commitment to reaching every corner of their region to hear from as wide a range of consumers as possible. It has been a privilege to work closely with the PHN and HCQ’s consumer hosts of Kitchen Tables and Yarning Circles, and other partners on this project.