April 26, 2011 -- A $126 million after-hours doctor advice helpline is on track to open on July 1, although the National Health Call Centre Network is yet to sign up a service provider for its program.
A Health Department spokeswoman said the network had finalised its evaluation of tenders for the plan, announced in last year's federal budget.
"It has selected a preferred provider and is currently negotiating terms and conditions," she said.
"An announcement will be made once this process is complete."
Unsuccessful bidders for the tender, which closed in February, had been notified, the spokeswoman said.
The service is intended to operate under the Medicare Locals umbrella, automatically redirecting patients' calls from individual clinics to a 24-hour hotline.
A nurse is to answer the call and transfer the caller to a doctor if necessary.
Trading as Healthdirect, the network already operates nurse-on-call triage services aimed at keeping non-urgent cases out of hospital emergency departments, and consumer advice services such as the Pregnancy, Birth and Baby Helpline. Triage services are provided by registered nurses who use a standard set of clinical decision-support algorithms to assess the best course of action for each caller and direct people to appropriate care.
Medibank Private has supplied these phone- and web-based services under contract to Healthdirect since the government-owned insurer bought out the original provider, McKesson Asia-Pacific, early last year.
Medibank and the federally funded network have been gearing themselves for growing business opportunities in tele-health, chronic disease management and the personally controlled e-health record program. The Health Department and Medicare Australia are finalising rebates for online specialist consultations so medical providers can be paid to deliver services remotely.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard has promised the GP after-hours hotline an additional $50m so it can add videoconferencing by the middle of next year.
The coming personal record rollout will require call-centre IT support for both consumers and medical providers.
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