REACCH Updates August 2012
Projects, upcoming conferences ,staff updates etc
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Conducting innovative research that identifies new approaches to the management of Sexually Transmissible and Bloodborne Viral Infections
Enhancing the clinical research capacity of individual participating ACCHS;
Ensuring effective translation of research skills and training into clinical practice;
Developing a new clinical research network with services by building capacity.
Updates
It has been a busy year for the Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services involved in REACH. There are a number of different research projects taking place at all the sites and here is a quick look at what’s happening.
MESSH (Monitoring and Evaluation for Sexual Health and Hepatis) ;
The Kirby Institute has developed a new reporting template for data extracted through GRHANITE. This will result in more user friendly data reporting to all sites involved in this project. The new report template was developed to make reporting consistent with the newly launched NACCHO Guidelines to Preventive Health and other National Testing guidelines. The report will be used in the next service site data feedback and will be used as the basis for continuous quality improvement initiatives under the MESHH project. Next reports for health services will be available in August 2012. Please send any feedback to Mary Ellen Harrod and Susan Huang.
Chlamydia testing, treatment and management of young people and antenatal clients ages 16-29, and interventions to increase opportunistic testing within REACH services.
Ethics application has been submitted and we have received preliminary reviews from the AH&MRC Ethics Committee which we are currently responding to. There is also a survey used to collect data for this project and final revisions are being completed.
Nunkuwarrin Yunti of South Australia Inc.:
The team has continued to work on the Healthy Liver Project, a retrospective evaluation of Hepatitis C treatment at the service. Progress to date has been setting up a database for clinical audit data and identifying patients who were involved in the treatment. Belinda Hammond Virginia Healey and Eva Pratt also developed and submitted an application for funding for a model of care targeting patients at risk of contracting BBV infection to the Lowitja Institute. Work on this project will begin with REACH funding with Belinda Hammond taking on a research role.
Aboriginal Medical Service of Western Sydney (AMSWS) :
There has been good progress on the Young Persons Camp Study which sought to engage young people in health service delivery in Western Sydney. AMSWS have also completed a retrospective audit of patients diagnosed with Hepatis B and have developed training around HBV treatment. Goodir Health Services : Sid Williams officially started at his role as the REACH Research Officer. He has developed a service project plan and will be focusing the Chlamydia Project and Capacity Development for the service around research.