Challenges Faced by Allied Health Professionals in Rural Australia

0Running Head: ALLIED HEALTH PROFESSIONALS
Allied Health Professionals

1ALLIED HEALTH PROFESSIONALS
Table of Contents
Table of Contents.............................................................................................................................2
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Describe the main issue...................................................................................................................3
The key and distinctive features of health service delivery in the rural or remote context.............5
Analysis of the case study................................................................................................................5
Relation with Wakerman’s definition of rural health......................................................................6
Geography....................................................................................................................................6
Strong multidisciplinary approach...............................................................................................6
GP substitution.............................................................................................................................6
Practitioners requiring public health skills..................................................................................6
Professional isolation...................................................................................................................7
Extended Clinical skills...............................................................................................................7
Cross-Cultural communication....................................................................................................7
Small dispersed often highly mobile groups...............................................................................7
High health needs........................................................................................................................7
Potential solutions and recommendations.......................................................................................7
Conclusion and recommendation....................................................................................................8
Reflection.........................................................................................................................................8
References......................................................................................................................................10

2ALLIED HEALTH PROFESSIONALS
Introduction
The allied health professionals such as apsychologist, occupational therapists and so on are
operating throughout the vast remote geography of rural Australia. Unlike the nurses or any other
medical personnel, they operate on a much widespread area providing support to the old and the
disabled people. The job of the allied health professionals is to work with a wide range of
disabilities both acquired in life and from birth disability. The acquired disabilities mainly
include disabilities from various accidents such as spinal cord injury and amputees in most
adults. However, they work with disabled children as well who have developing disabilities from
birth such as autism, cerebral palsy and so on. The main aim of the allied professionals is to help
their patients overcome their issues and lead an as much normal life as they can. The therapists
are required to provide the help on time so that the problems of the disabled do not pile up
resulting in requiring more allied health professionals. This study discusses the various issues,
which the allied health professionals face during their delivery of service. The study also
contains some recommended solutions, which are to be used to solve these issues. The relation
of the Wakeman’s definition of rural health to the present health of rural Australia has also been
presented in the study.
Describe the main issue
Practising health service in the rural areas of Australia can be very challenging. The main issue,
which the allied health professionals face, is the unavailability of enough health professionals
from whom the patients can access therapy. Research shows that not enough people choose to be
an allied health professional in rural areas as a career. However, the people taking up this choice
are not retained properly in their respective fields. Although the AHP workforces operating
outside the urban areas receive extra attention from the NDIS scheme makers.
With the introduction of the National Disability Insurance Scheme, the demands for these special
services are expected to go up. However, with the increasing demand, the quality and the
availability of the service providers are expected to decrease as there is already a scarcity of