What is HealthPathways WA?
HealthPathways WA is a web-based portal with condition-specific ‘pathways'. Each pathway supports clinicians with assessment, management and local referral information. The HealthPathways site is designed to be used at point of care primarily by general practitioners but is also available to hospital specialists, nurses and other health professionals across Western Australia.
The secure portal is not for use by patients, however there will be appropriate local resources for GPs to provide to patients.
HealthPathways WA uses a highly successful New Zealand model which aims to maximise health outcomes for our community:
- Designed to improve health services delivery across WA
- Tailored to local health services (e.g. referrals to local specialists)
- Improves collaboration between GPs and specialists.
Who is involved?
The portal is being developed in collaboration with general practitioners, hospital specialists, allied health providers, key stakeholders and the community.
The WA Primary Health Alliance (WAPHA) is administering the portal.
Working Groups (WGs) consisting of specialists, GPs and key stakeholders are established to identify issues affecting patient care in a particular service area. They propose solutions to issues identified, and while WGs do not write or sign off on pathways, they will review or comment on them.
Benefits for GPs
HealthPathways is efficient, simple and quick to use. It will assist GPs to provide the most effective treatment and find local specialists and services for their patients.
To access the portal GPs will simply:
- Log on to the website
- Search for the patient’s condition
- Access assessment and management options, and information on referrals to local specialists and services.
Benefits for patients
Patients will get the right treatment or specialist care with shorter waiting time. GPs will also have quick access to educational resources for patients which will enable them to better manage their own health.
The HealthPathways WA process
Each pathway goes through the development stages:
- Establish the Working Group (WG)
- Draft content of localised pathway by Clinical Editor
- Review of draft pathway by Subject Matter Experts (SMEs)
- Finalise pathway and publish on the portal
- Continuous improvement and scheduled formal reviews.
Download HealthPathways WA fact sheet (PDF).