Nursing Director of Community and Primary Health Care, Joanne Shaw was one of three speakers at the conference there to talk about chronic disease management in the North West. 

The other two from Mount Isa were senior health worker Aunty Fran Page and Indigenous health worker Kirsten Gallagher.

“(Aunty Fran, Kirsten) and I were able to present on managing chronic disease in remote Queensland, as invited speakers and our presentation was well received with lots of positive feedback,” Ms Shaw said.

“We were able to showcase the great work done by the Chronic Disease and Primary Health Care.”

Ms Shaw sat on a panel on flexible funding methodologies, and chaired the Sydney conference on the second day.

“The other delegates were really impressed with our health worker-led models of care and the chronic disease models of care,” she said.

“All our health workers are Indigenous health workers, and that helps us to communicate effectively with patients and supports culturally sensitive care.”

Ms Shaw said their model was unusual in that the health worker led the service in the direction that it’s going to go.

“For example, our Hearing Health is solely run by health workers,” she said.

“The smoking cessation clinics were also seen as innovative, because they’re nurse practitioner led, rather than doctor led as in other places.

“Conference attenders were also impressed with our preventative model; from our ante natal programs right through to our aged care service.”

And when Ms Shaw put up a map showing the NWHHS covered an area bigger than Victoria, she got a great reaction.

“They were all quite blown away by the remoteness and the distances we cover. I think we left them with a lasting impression.”