Media Release
25 August 2009
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Outdated processes affect the health and
pocket of the average Australian
The peak body for Podiatry in Australia and New Zealand, the Australasian Podiatry Council
(APodC) today said the Federal Government’s recently released final National Health and
Hospitals Reform Commission (NHHRC) report was a significant step in revitalising an
outdated and inefficient health care system.
Mr Brenden Brown, clinician and President of the APodC said recent consultation with
government health officials and reports in the media suggested changes would provide podiatrists
with the professional autonomy they had been seeking for decades.
“In the Australian health care system today a practicing
podiatrist (like other allied health
professionals) cannot refer a patient to a medical specialist, prescribe certain medicines critical to
a patient’s wellbeing or even simply refer a client to a hospital podiatrist, without first referring
the client back to their GP,” said Mr Brown.
“Many people outside the health sector don’t understand that this outdated approach to client or
patient care is not only out of step with international standards, it often results in the extension of
patient waiting periods and a higher incidence of foot complications that can include increased
risk of amputation.”
Mr Brown said the podiatry profession believed the interests of patients could be better met if
allied health professionals were given common referral and prescribing rights and patients ready
access to foot and ankle clinics.
Recent diabetic foot research in Australia shows the efficacy in relation to patient care could be
vastly improved if multidisciplinary teams made up of podiatrists, physicians and vascular
surgeons were a common part of the public health care system.
Mr Brown said there was a body of work that supported the notion waiting times, poor patient
outcomes and lack of GPs and specialists could be overcome if these suggested changes to the
health care system became a reality.
Brown also suggested that evidence of inappropriate referrals by GPs could be reduced if patients
with foot problems were screened by multidisciplinary foot teams of health professionals. He also
claimed this approach would ‘free up’ valuable GP and medical specialist time, therefore
allowing these clinicians to focus on more complex patients.
Mr Brown said this nexus of issues: the timeliness of patient consultations, the current lack of
availability of GP and specialist care, underuse of allied health professionals expertise and
inappropriate referrals was hurting the health and pockets of the average Australian and costing
the public health care system millions.
Brown claimed these issues also made it difficult for the podiatry profession to provide
appropriate care for those individuals with chronic diseases, like diabetes and the diabetic foot.
“There are 1.5 million diabetes sufferers in Australia today with another 275 Australians
diagnosed every day. 1-5% of Australian hospital beds carry a diabetic foot complication and
an estimated 200,000 Australians (15% of diabetics) are affected by foot ulcers, with a further
1-3% of Australians (or 45,000 people) having already lost a limb to amputation,” said Mr
Brown.
Mr Brown said freely available data from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare
(AIHW) calculates up to 200,000 occupied hospital beds, 4,000 amputations and 1,000 deaths
each year were due to diabetic foot ulcers in Australia. However, best diabetic foot research
demonstrates that up to 80% of these cases could be prevented if multidisciplinary foot care
teams (that included a podiatrist) were introduced into the health care system.
“The five year mortality rate for the diabetic foot is 25% higher than that of breast cancer, and
second only to lung cancer, but without radical changes to the health care system; radical
change that sees the wholesale adoption of foot and ankle clinics in hospitals and community
centres, we cannot hope to address an epidemic that is killing 1,000 Australians a year,” said
Mr Brown.
For more information contact Nick Green at the Australasian Podiatry Council on 040582518 or (03)
9416 3111
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