Healthdirect expands virtual care pathways

Healthdirect Australia is working with government health departments to increase the care pathways via the healthdirect service, connecting callers to the most appropriate type of virtual and urgent care pathways, and distributing demand more evenly across a pressured health system.

Over the past year, the healthdirect helpline received 1.3 million calls with two thirds of calls occurring after-hours and a significant proportion coming from rural, remote and regional areas.

New care options now provide Australians with more ways to receive the medical care they need, in the right place, at the time they need it. These include virtual GP call-back, urgent care clinics and virtual EDs — all integrated into the healthdirect helpline and providing further support for callers.

When a person calls healthdirect, they speak with a registered nurse and undergo a series of triage questions that allow the nurse to determine the right type of care for their situation, which may range from self-care, to seeing a GP, a variety of virtual or urgent care options, or to attend ED.

Virtual GP

Healthdirect Australia operates a virtual GP pathway which offers a call back from a GP to healthdirect callers. Half of the calls are made during the 5pm to 2am period, with three quarters of callers provided advice on how to look after themselves at home. The availability of this option is especially valuable for parents of small children, who make up two thirds of callers, providing reassurance that they can stay home at night with their sick kids.

healthdirect GPs can provide callers with an e-prescription via SMS which can be filled using a QR code the following day. The GPs also upload prescriptions, medical certificates and a call summary to the caller’s My Health Record so it is available to their regular GP.

Urgent care clinics

The healthdirect helpline can connect consumers to the emerging urgent care services across the country, offering an alternative to attending an emergency department. Urgent care clinics can deal with a range of illnesses and ailments that require urgent attention. A healthdirect nurse may advise a caller whose situation is urgent but not life-threatening to visit an urgent care clinic and, in NSW, the nurse can make an online appointment at the nearest clinic for the caller.

Australians can also search for the nearest open urgent care clinic using the healthdirect Service Finder. To date, 84,300 “urgent care” searches have been made on Service Finder, a third of which were supported by the tool’s guided search function which helps users understand which urgent care clinic is right for them.

Virtual emergency departments

In several states, helpline triage nurses can connect callers to a virtual ED pathway for a telehealth consultation. These are free services for non-life-threatening emergencies where patients can access emergency care 24/7 via a video consultation (provided by the healthdirect Video Call platform). The service is staffed by emergency physicians, GPs, registrars and nurses who can advise patients on the care they need.

Each state service is slightly different, with services that provide care pathways for children and adults. The paediatric clinicians assess, treat and refer care based on each child’s needs and co-design care plan with parents and carers. This way, parents and children are supported with emergency advice and monitoring.

Between April 2023 and March 2024, virtual emergency consultations via healthdirect Video Call were provided to 230,387 patients in Victoria, South Australia and WA, the states currently using this option.

These pathways are more convenient for the patients, offering them easier access to healthcare at less cost. They also actively help to reduce pressure on busy hospital emergency departments by providing an alternative to a GP if one is not immediately available.