Health Reform in Australia: Objectives, Strengths, Weaknesses, and Strategies

This text discusses the ongoing state of health financing in Australia, with a focus on chronic disease and aging population. It explores the objectives, strengths, weaknesses, and strategies of the recent health reform in Australia.

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Health Reform in Australia

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Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Description of Health Reform.........................................................................................................4
Objective behind Health Reform.....................................................................................................4
Strength of health reform.................................................................................................................5
Weaknesses of health reform...........................................................................................................6
Strategy and explore opportunities for further reform development...............................................7
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................9
References......................................................................................................................................10
References......................................................................................................................................12

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Introduction
Australia has associatively set publicly funded health system that is connected by the “universal
access” principle. In the context of the healthcare system of Australia, there is an effective hybrid
of a universally-exist public system along with the regulated and managed the private system.
Australian Government is spending more than $150 billion each year to the public healthcare
services but it is necessary for the government to focus on the reform of policy as it will help to
increase the attention towards chronic conditions (Cameron, Earnest, Farivar, Strauss & Gao,
2015).
The main aim of this paper is to consider the ongoing state of the financing of health services in
Australia, related to chronic disease and the issue related to the aging of the population. Along
with that, this paper will propose the major public discussion on the financing of health and care
services in Australia, which main focus on the conditions of the chronic health. It has been
analyzed that there are numerous requirements which need to be focused by the healthcare
system of Australia for the purpose of bringing better facility related to the healthcare in
Australia. The discussion will be made on the recent health reform in Australia which is chronic
conditions of the population. The elaboration will be made on health reform in Australia along
with objectives, strengths, and weaknesses. At last the strategy and the recommendations will be
provided so that the future implication can be done in an efficient manner.

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Description of Health Reform
The major issue for Australia is how to regenerate the remaining health funding and service
management by better design to be comprehensive of and the long term care needs of disease
related to the chronic. There is another need for prevention of chronic disease and early
involvement in the route of chronic diseases to prevent bad conditions of the health, entailing in
economic and social impacts and costs. Health reform in Australia regarding chronic disease has
been made in 2018. According to this improvement, it has been analyzed that the health care is
not a concern for a few as 1 in 3 Australians who age is more than 45 are having a chronic
disease and 1 in 5 have a number of chronic conditions. Australia has realized that there is a need
to bring improvement in such condition through healthcare systems because the treatment of
such chronic condition will cost money. It has been found that Australia government invest more
than $150 billion on the health care system but there is not firmly opinion held regarding where
this money goes (Bartlett, Butler & Haines, 2016). To improve this concern, the Australian
Health Policy Collaboration was formed in 2015 to create from the task of the program of the
health at Mitchell Institute over last two years. the collaboration is considered as the independent
think tank that targets is to focus on needed attention to the significant requirement for
considerable policy reform which is focused on the addressing the health issue related to the
chronic disease on the national level.
There are key chronic conditions such as cancers, diabetes, and chronic obstructive disease,
musculoskeletal and mental disorder (Swerissen, Duckett & Wright, 2016). These chronic
diseases are not taken into serious consideration by the government of Australia while it has the
same kind of risk factors that impact the lifestyle of the citizen of Australia. In the context of the

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health reform in Australia, the chronic disease model has been produced in order to recognize
and elaborate the vital aspects for developing the health systems at the organization and
community. According to Australia’s Health 2014 (AIHW, 2014), there is a massive rate of
morality in 2011 which was being done by heart disease and another chronic disease. The health
reform in Australia can improve the condition of the people who are suffering from chronic
conditions.
The objective behind Health Reform
The main objective of the health reform in Australia is to focus on the public and private doctors
and their training towards the reduction of the chronic conditions so that the impact of the health
issues can reduce the death rate of people due to this condition. The improvement in the policy
should have a strong focus on the concerns related to the health of prevention of chronic disease.
It has been analyzed that these concerns have become the major confront and this has been
accepted by the Government of Australia. However, Australia health care concerned towards the
various kinds of diseases but there are an ample of complexity such as healthcare demand,
preventable chronic disease, service delivery and rising health costs which become the reasons of
annoyance in the view of the governments and individuals alike (Dennis, et. al., 2008). That is
why the improvement in the health policy and the services for chronic conditions are entailed
under this reformation. In conjunction with, there is the aim of the reform in Australia regarding
the chronic conditions which are elaborated below:

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 The providers of health service are to discover and come back with to a variety of factors
connected to the risk that put into the development of the avoidable chronic disease by
taking deliberation of the chronic disease.
 To make an effectual harmonization between health service providers so that patients can
get a high standard of behaviour from the public and private healthcare organizations.
The strength of health reform
The healthcare system of Australia is amended as there is a big demand for mental health
services. The major strength of the reformation in Australia regarding the chronic condition is
that it took a different area which was not concerned by any other health care services
(Battersby, 2005). to consider this strength, it is necessary for the health care service to keep the
focus on the funding arrangements and policy that should be relied on the evidence of what type
of work are able to accomplish the ongoing confronts (Mossialos, et. al., 2015). As per this
reformation, it has been found that there are many changes have been done in the technologies
especially in diagnostic imaging that leads the business in driving better and earlier diagnosis.
The expenditures of pharmaceutical per person are assumed to amplify from $420 in 2014-15 to
$474 in 2027-28 (AHPC, 2015). The funding of Australian governments in public hospitals has
amplified in present years to $568 per person. In the context of the private sector, it has been
found that the health expenditure per person rebate on health insurance is fairly stable (Donato &
Segal, 2013).
It is necessary for Australia to redevelop the policy and the funding arrangements of the country
so that they can become more focused and inclusive on the long-running needs of chronic

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diseases. There is another major strong factor that the protection in the curve of chronic disease
to turn away towards away preventable ill-health and its results, entailing social as well as
economic influences and costs. Along with that, there is another major positive aspect in the
amendments in the policy of the healthcare system of Australia is that it has developed high
standards healthcare services to the patient of the country (Nolte & McKee, 2008). The
healthcare system of Australia is breakdown into valuable factors such as Medicare, Medicare
safety net, Medicare rebates, Medicare levy, public healthcare, and private healthcare. The rebate
of the public as well as private services is fixed but it is not necessary that entire cost should be
formed.
Weaknesses of health reform
There is major apprehensive regarding this reform as healthcare policy of Australia is due to the
planned enlargement in expenditure in that much by which explanation can be done in a valuable
mode with the improved ending for a lesser amount of input (Louviere & Flynn, 2010). It has
been analyzed that the costs are not stable and it would not be possible to similar the amount for
the long period. There is a huge burden on the Australian healthcare services due to chronic
diseases that lead the death rate in the number of nations, including Australia. It has been
evaluated that still 1 in 10 patients has to wait for the long time of surgery in more than 8 months
and 1 in 30 patients would wait for a year to be treated well (Tinetti, Fried & Boyd, 2012). There
is a weakness of this reform of mixture of public and private funding that makes the Australia
health system hybrid by nature. It has been found that the Ageing populations, with associated
developing population burden of chronic disease, have become confront to the national health
because of the increased demand of the health services. It has been found in the context of the

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challenge that patients with chronic conditions are not given proper treatment by the national
health system. The charge of health services is also increasing at double the pace of GDP.
Strategy and explore opportunities for further reform development
It is required for the healthcare services of Australia to put the customer at the middle of reform
by developing the customer-focused models which will help out to make sure that Australia is
delivering quality outcomes on a constant basis for its residents by entailing better patient health
outcomes, lower costs, and satisfaction (Kronick, Bella & Gilmer, 2009). The strategy of
concerted focus on prevention and wellness will provide the exciting potential to decrease the
death rates from heart disease, cancer, stroke, and diabetes. Encouragement modernism
diagonally the healthcare significance chain is entailing the huge importance of the public-
private partnership which would be helpful to make sure about the long-term sustainability in the
healthcare system of Australia. The health sector of Australia can provide as the model for
different countries and give to the development of the economy in the form of the export market,
especially in Asia (Ward, Schiller & Goodman, 2014).
For further reform development, it is required by the health system of Australia to involve below
mentioned five policy levers.
Integrated funding and management: it is the move to a gathered source of government
funding to get rid of bureaucratic cost shifting and duplication that is connected with the private
sector alignments.
Consumer Empowerment and Responsibility: this principle should cover the empowerment
and self-awareness regarding health issues for the purpose of decreasing the health concerns.

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There should be patient-centric care and smarter lifestyles which should be adopted by the
citizens of Australia.
Optimized care pathways: it would be the policy which will entail the optimized pathways to
facilitate make sure ‘the right care, at the right place, at the right time’. This will give a
fundamental for private as well as public re-investment indefinite care setting mix with various-
disciplinary teams.
Wellness and prevention: put much huge importance on anticipatory approached to deliberate
the development in demand for health services.
Information-enabled health networks: it shows that there should be the proper adoption of the
broad range of application of developing technologies to encourage consumers, facilitate
clinicians develop outcomes of the patient, accept face-to-face confronts and connect the analytic
strength while making sure fortification from cybersecurity risks.
With the help of the above mentioned five policies, Australian health care services will be able to
constant to have global access to improve affordable healthcare, with integrating high standards
of quality services.

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Conclusion
It can be concluded from the above discussion that healthcare services in Australia are improved
by government’s contribution of Australia. This report has entailed healthcare reform in
Australia in which the chronic diseases are highlighted because it has been found from the above
analysis that 1 in3 Australian who age is more than 45 are having a chronic disease. The cost of
medications is cutting under this reform. The strength and weaknesses of this health reform have
been mentioned in this report.

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References
AHPC, (2015). The Case for Change Towards Universal and Sustainable National Health
Insurance & Financing for Australia. Retrieved from: .
Bartlett, C. Butler, S. & Haines, L. (2016). Reimagining health reform in Australia: Taking a
systems approach to health and wellness. Retrieved from: .
Battersby, M. W. (2005). Health reform through coordinated care: SA HealthPlus. BMJ: British
Medical Journal, 330(7492), 662.
Cameron, R., Earnest, J., Farivar, F., Strauss, P., & Gao, G. (2015). Skilled migration in a
resource rich state of Australia. Work and Learning in the Era of Globalisation:
Challenges for the 21st Century.
Dennis, S. M., Zwar, N., Griffiths, R., Roland, M., Hasan, I., Davies, G. P., & Harris, M. (2008).
Chronic disease management in primary care: from evidence to policy. Medical Journal
of Australia, 188(8), S53.
Donato, R., & Segal, L. (2013). Does Australia have the appropriate health reform agenda to
close the gap in Indigenous health?. Australian Health Review, 37(2), 232-238.
Kronick, R. G., Bella, M., & Gilmer, T. P. (2009). The faces of Medicaid III: Refining the
portrait of people with multiple chronic conditions. Center for Health Care Strategies,
Inc, 1-30.

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Louviere, J. J., & Flynn, T. N. (2010). Using best-worst scaling choice experiments to measure
public perceptions and preferences for healthcare reform in Australia. The Patient:
Patient-Centered Outcomes Research, 3(4), 275-283.
Mossialos, E., Courtin, E., Naci, H., Benrimoj, S., Bouvy, M., Farris, K., ... & Sketris, I. (2015).
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pharmacists in chronic disease management. Health Policy, 119(5), 628-639.
Nolte, E., & McKee, M. (Eds.). (2008). Caring for people with chronic conditions: a health
system perspective. McGraw-Hill Education (UK).
Swerissen, H., Duckett, S. J., & Wright, J. (2016). Chronic failure in primary care. Grattan
Institute.
Tinetti, M. E., Fried, T. R., & Boyd, C. M. (2012). Designing health care for the most common
chronic condition—multimorbidity. Jama, 307(23), 2493-2494.
Ward, B. W., Schiller, J. S., & Goodman, R. A. (2014). Peer reviewed: Multiple chronic
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