HPARA Seeking Reform in Healthcare
Donation protected
HPARA
Seeking Reform in Australian Healthcare.
Health Professionals Australia Reform Association was formed and registered as a limited guarantee Non for profit organisation in 2015. There are seven foundation members of whom four became directors to later be joined by another in 2017 when one of the directors was unable to attend board meetings and stood aside on leave. The board is now back to the 2015 composition following the return from leave of the original member who played an important and pivotal role in establishing the association and subsequently filled the offices of secretary and treasurer until September 2017.
There have been significant changes in workplace culture over the last two decades that have become serious problems in regard to health services delivery. This has had disastrous consequences for health professionals who have been dishonestly referred to the Australian Health Practitioners Regulatory Agency AHPRA. Many of the short comings of the agency were revealed in the two Senate inquires, 2016 and 2017 that have had no response from politicians nor health administrations.
All but one of the directors and the majority of health practitioner members have been victim of abuse of the AHPRA notification system under the guise of mandatory notifications. AHPRA has frequently acted without offering the individual who has been notified due process, natural justice and assumption of innocence. Thus, conditions have been placed on the practice of the notified practitioner before investigation of the complaint and often these have been placed on the AHPRA public record. The investigation by AHPRA can take a long time; this was two years and one month in one case in which a cascade of notifications was lodged over time and all found to be unsubstantiated. The practitioner was then notified by AHPRA of the findings headed by an apology from the board.
The practitioner was a leader in his field, initially gained his primary medical education and specialist qualification in his country of birth and subsequently worked in the UK and two tertiary metropolitan hospitals in Australia. He was obliged to sit the examinations for entry to the Australian specialist college and was successful. Thus, he had attained qualification in his speciality in two countries that are recognised as having excellent standards as well as having worked in the UK without any problem. He moved to a regional area that services a population of three quarters of a million and established a busy highly successful practice as the only practitioner in his field. Other practitioners who dabbled in his area of practice as well as practising in other speciality areas banded together and notified him to AHPRA.
The apology and findings from AHPRA were far too late. The practitioner was devastated by the events. He was rescued from a well-known suicide site late one evening by his Australian born wife and they, together with their two Australian born children, returned his native country where he has developed a busy practice in his speciality. There are a multitude of examples similar to this amongst the HPARA membership and no doubt others for those who have not joined as well as future cases that will occur.
Other groups apart from health professionals such as students and trainees, some of whom are HPARA members, have experienced problems such as bullying, improper advances and other threats.
HPARA members are not the only losers when these things occur. The whole community suffers the loss of services provided by those who have been targeted, the services are often difficult to replace and the reputation of organisations as employers is brought into question.
There is no clear pathway within the current system to gain justice for our members. We have attempted to interest politicians to act but there has been no indication that they have an interest in doing so despite Senate inquiries in 2016 and 2017 that exposed the deficiencies within AHPRA. Medical Indemnity Insurance providers have been ineffective in providing the necessary mechanism to give the services that are needed.
The only way that members can get recompense appears to be via legal action against the perpetrators of their plight. This is no easy task in view of the financial costs involved in engaging lawyers to represent victims and their families who have suffered not only financially but also professionally, psychologically and matrimonially. Children have been left in a single parent situation because of such events and lives lost.
HPARA is unaware of any action by AHPRA to penalise those who have lodged dishonest notifications to AHPRA. The HPARA board has set up a GoFundMe facility to enable it to provide funding for members to undertake legal action against those who abuse the system and welcomes contributions to the fund that will be used exclusively to assist members and their families to seek recompense.
Other groups apart from health professionals such as students, some of whom are HPARA members, have experienced problems such as bullying, improper advances and other threats. A recent article in Independent Australia revealed the difficulties experienced by overseas-born recent graduates from medical schools in Australia in obtaining positions in Australian hospitals to commence work to attain registration as medical practitioners in Australia. This is a waste of monies spent in training them and a calamity for them personally both financially and their future. There are many regional, rural and remote areas in Australia that have great difficulty in gaining access to services of a resident local medical practitioner. The larger regional hospitals should be used to give these recent graduates the training they need to gain registration. State government scholarships for such training were available in the mid-20th century and an excellent way of training recent graduates who, when they attained registration were then committed to practice for a period of time in rural and remote areas as a condition of being awarded a scholarship.
Seeking Reform in Australian Healthcare.
Health Professionals Australia Reform Association was formed and registered as a limited guarantee Non for profit organisation in 2015. There are seven foundation members of whom four became directors to later be joined by another in 2017 when one of the directors was unable to attend board meetings and stood aside on leave. The board is now back to the 2015 composition following the return from leave of the original member who played an important and pivotal role in establishing the association and subsequently filled the offices of secretary and treasurer until September 2017.
There have been significant changes in workplace culture over the last two decades that have become serious problems in regard to health services delivery. This has had disastrous consequences for health professionals who have been dishonestly referred to the Australian Health Practitioners Regulatory Agency AHPRA. Many of the short comings of the agency were revealed in the two Senate inquires, 2016 and 2017 that have had no response from politicians nor health administrations.
All but one of the directors and the majority of health practitioner members have been victim of abuse of the AHPRA notification system under the guise of mandatory notifications. AHPRA has frequently acted without offering the individual who has been notified due process, natural justice and assumption of innocence. Thus, conditions have been placed on the practice of the notified practitioner before investigation of the complaint and often these have been placed on the AHPRA public record. The investigation by AHPRA can take a long time; this was two years and one month in one case in which a cascade of notifications was lodged over time and all found to be unsubstantiated. The practitioner was then notified by AHPRA of the findings headed by an apology from the board.
The practitioner was a leader in his field, initially gained his primary medical education and specialist qualification in his country of birth and subsequently worked in the UK and two tertiary metropolitan hospitals in Australia. He was obliged to sit the examinations for entry to the Australian specialist college and was successful. Thus, he had attained qualification in his speciality in two countries that are recognised as having excellent standards as well as having worked in the UK without any problem. He moved to a regional area that services a population of three quarters of a million and established a busy highly successful practice as the only practitioner in his field. Other practitioners who dabbled in his area of practice as well as practising in other speciality areas banded together and notified him to AHPRA.
The apology and findings from AHPRA were far too late. The practitioner was devastated by the events. He was rescued from a well-known suicide site late one evening by his Australian born wife and they, together with their two Australian born children, returned his native country where he has developed a busy practice in his speciality. There are a multitude of examples similar to this amongst the HPARA membership and no doubt others for those who have not joined as well as future cases that will occur.
Other groups apart from health professionals such as students and trainees, some of whom are HPARA members, have experienced problems such as bullying, improper advances and other threats.
HPARA members are not the only losers when these things occur. The whole community suffers the loss of services provided by those who have been targeted, the services are often difficult to replace and the reputation of organisations as employers is brought into question.
There is no clear pathway within the current system to gain justice for our members. We have attempted to interest politicians to act but there has been no indication that they have an interest in doing so despite Senate inquiries in 2016 and 2017 that exposed the deficiencies within AHPRA. Medical Indemnity Insurance providers have been ineffective in providing the necessary mechanism to give the services that are needed.
The only way that members can get recompense appears to be via legal action against the perpetrators of their plight. This is no easy task in view of the financial costs involved in engaging lawyers to represent victims and their families who have suffered not only financially but also professionally, psychologically and matrimonially. Children have been left in a single parent situation because of such events and lives lost.
HPARA is unaware of any action by AHPRA to penalise those who have lodged dishonest notifications to AHPRA. The HPARA board has set up a GoFundMe facility to enable it to provide funding for members to undertake legal action against those who abuse the system and welcomes contributions to the fund that will be used exclusively to assist members and their families to seek recompense.
Other groups apart from health professionals such as students, some of whom are HPARA members, have experienced problems such as bullying, improper advances and other threats. A recent article in Independent Australia revealed the difficulties experienced by overseas-born recent graduates from medical schools in Australia in obtaining positions in Australian hospitals to commence work to attain registration as medical practitioners in Australia. This is a waste of monies spent in training them and a calamity for them personally both financially and their future. There are many regional, rural and remote areas in Australia that have great difficulty in gaining access to services of a resident local medical practitioner. The larger regional hospitals should be used to give these recent graduates the training they need to gain registration. State government scholarships for such training were available in the mid-20th century and an excellent way of training recent graduates who, when they attained registration were then committed to practice for a period of time in rural and remote areas as a condition of being awarded a scholarship.
Organizer and beneficiary
Dan De Zoysa
Organizer
Southern Lamington QLD
Don Kane
Beneficiary
