Helping communities and practices rebuild

Helping communities and practices rebuild

The NSW Rural Health Natural Disaster and Emergency Stakeholder Group is working together to help communities and practices rebuild in the aftermath of the floods – assisting in the immediate, short to medium-, and long-term recovery in Northern NSW.

As NSW is hit by back-to-back floods, the primary health care workforce is working around the clock to maintain services while simultaneously dealing with damage to clinics and personal losses. In response, AMA (NSW) is partnering with NSW Rural Doctors Network (RDN) and with other organisations in the sector to ensure the delivery of coordinated, targeted support.

The Rural NSW Natural Disaster and Emergency Stakeholder Group (NDE Group) first came together to synchronise resourcing in response to the 2020 bushfires and COVID. AMA (NSW) is a member of the group – which comprises more than 35 government and peak body agencies – and they have now reconvened to respond to the NSW floods.

Priority activities include:

Mental health support

Many health professionals have been directly impacted by the floods. Looking after their mental health is essential if they are to continue to care for their community.

#RuralHealthTogether is a portal providing rural health professionals with self-care support and access to wellbeing related information, both for themselves and for their patients, and contains flood specific resources. Other initiatives include RACGP’s GP Support Program for members. The AMA subsidiary, DRS4DRS, provides free support for any doctor or medical student across Australia.

The Medical Benevolent Association of NSW (MBANSW) is also actively supporting doctors whose homes and practices have been devastated across 57 Local Government Areas. MBANSW provides counselling and short-term financial assistance through times of crisis, illness, accident, mental health conditions, grief, and loss of income to help doctors and their families in NSW and the ACT to recover and return to independence and wherever possible their vocation.

Keeping health services functioning – telehealth

As a result of the floods, many practices have become unusable or inaccessible. As an interim measure, access to telehealth services has been significantly extended. RDN’s Telehealth resources offer support to practices and practitioners new to telehealth.

Finding financial and other support for flood-affected practices and practitioners

The rural health community platform Rural Health Pro has developed an overview of key recovery grants and assistance available to support the rural health workforce and relieve some of the costs of rebuilding practices. This includes information on identity and document replacement, housing help and clean up assistance.

Here for the long haul

Building resilience and mitigating risk in our rural communities calls for long-term risk management, planning and deploying solutions based on our collective experience, emerging science and technology, and latest research. In 2021, the NDE group developed the Natural Disaster and Emergency Learnings and Recommendations Report with leaders in the NSW and national health sector, providing recommendations to guide efforts towards greater resilience and more informed emergency management responses in NSW.  

AMA (NSW) will continue to work with RDN and other groups in the sector towards the implementation of these recommendations, while also continuing to address the current situation in Northern NSW.  Find out more about NSW Rural Doctors Network – https://www.nswrdn.com.au/.