Small communities across South Western NSW now have access to expert cardiac care on their doorstep, thanks to a new Outreach Heart Failure Diagnostic Clinic.
The Outreach Heart Failure Diagnostic Clinic is delivered by Murrumbidgee Local Health District in conjunction with local General Practices, and has so far visited West Wyalong, Temora and Hay, with the next clinic scheduled for Lake Cargelligo on 27 and 28 June.
The clinic is funded through a collaboration between MLHD and the Murrumbidgee Primary Health Network.
Minister for Regional Health, Ryan Park, said the outreach clinic is an important tool in delivering high-quality healthcare to patients in rural, regional and remote communities.
"Through this clinic we're able to bring expert cardiac care right into the heart of smaller communities," Mr Park said.
"Patients can receive specialist care without the burden of having to travel long distances from home.
"Clinics like these are really important to small communities, and it is hoped that as a result of the care they provide to the community, we will reduce preventable emergency department presentations and hospital admissions."
MLHD's Director Integrated Care and Allied Health, Emma Field, said the clinic aims to ensure patients who are identified as being at elevated risk, or who are showing symptoms of heart failure, have timely access to screening and assessment.
"Our goal is to improve quality of life for our patients," Ms Field said.
"The Clinic also gives patients access to diagnostics including echocardiography, which is an ultrasound of the heart, at no cost to the patient.
"We are grateful for the support of Associate Professor Andrew Roy, who works out of St Vincent's Private in Sydney, and Griffith and clinical physiologist Sharon Kay."
Anitha Stanley, a Transitional Nurse Practitioner-Heart Failure with MLHD's Chronic Respiratory and Heart Failure Team, was part of the team that recently held the first outreach clinic in Hay.
Ms Stanley said there was such strong demand for the Outreach Heart Failure Diagnostic Clinic from the community that it was held over two days.
"Patients are very appreciative of these clinics as they get timely access to early diagnostic intervention without having to travel and without any financial burden to them," she said.
"Our patients are not only receiving comprehensive clinical assessments and echocardiography, but they are also linked in with other services.
"It's a patient-centred approach to health care and timely escalation for appropriate medical and surgical management."
