Despite a higher burden of illness and chronic disease, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people access fewer Medicare-rebated specialist services than non-indigenous people, prompting calls from a peak medical group for a national approach to address the inequity.
Royal Australasian College of Physicians president Professor Nicholas Talley said a national framework was needed to address the significant gap for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people accessing specialist medical care.
“We do know, in parts of the country there are actually some systems that are working reasonably well. But they’re patchy and isolated and not co-ordinated, and there’s lots of areas where that’s not working well,” he said.
“What we’d like to do is promote the concept of a national network – a co-ordinated, consistent system that leads to equitable access and obviously improves outcomes.”