Te Whatu Ora Waikato has adopted a new attendant task management solution, replacing its old system that had contributed to bottlenecks in patient flow. 

About 130 attendants of the organisation who manage over 1,200 tasks daily can now send and receive notifications in real-time using Alcidion's Smartpage non-clinical solution. 

According to a media release, Smartpage facilitates "rapid, reliable, and contextual" messaging with electronic requests, instant dispatching, and self-allocation. It provides them with a centralised view of all requests and resource availability and allows them to self-assign and self-dispatch to outstanding tasks or reallocate when they are busy. Additionally, the solution gives them the ability to book cleaning services. 

The New South Wales Government has recently expanded statewide its virtual urgent care service for children.

Delivered by the Sydney Children’s Hospitals Network and Hunter New England Local Health District (HNELHD), the free virtualKIDS service connects families with a clinical nurse who helps determine the best care pathway for their children and their non-life-threatening health concerns.

Accessed via referral on Healthdirect, virtualKIDS is available for children up to the age of 16. The service was initially offered across South Eastern Sydney, Western Sydney and HNE LHDs. Since it was piloted in 2021 during the height of the pandemic, it has kept two in three kids referred to the service from going to the emergency department, helping relieve some pressure. 

The statewide expansion of virtualKIDS, which is part of the current NSW government's commitment to delivering 25 urgent care services by mid-2025, is now expected to support at least 500 NSW children and their families each month. 

NSW Health Minister Ryan Park added that the service will see specialist paediatric advice provided to clinicians in rural and regional hospitals and paramedics in non-emergency situations.

iMedX will continue providing clinical transcription services to health services in New Zealand's Northern Region after resecuring a tender from Te Whatu Ora.

The health IT provider has been delivering medical transcription solutions to the region for over six years. 

The Tasmanian government recently put up the ED waiting times dashboard online to provide citizens with access to information on current ED wait times for non-urgent patients. 

This comes as the number of ED presentations is on the rise with emergency teams across the state treating over 480 people daily and demand surge kicking on weekends and during holidays. 

"I want to stress that the new dashboard is not relevant for those people who are critically unwell," Tasmania Health Minister Guy Barnett stressed. He added that those who require emergency medical care for serious injury or illness should always go to the nearest ED immediately while those with injuries or illnesses that are not life-threatening should explore other options such as seeking advice from Healthdirect.

Aged and home care provider BaptistCare is enhancing customer communication and experience by onboarding Hayylo. 

According to a media release, the care organisation will initially roll out Hayylo's customer service platform and client portal to AlayaCare, its home care business, before integrating the solution across its other segments. 

BaptistCare at home general manager Sarah Newman said they "want to make it as easy as possible for clients and family members to access all the information they want about the services they are receiving, and request changes simply and easily."