By Angela Dorizas

Prime Minister Julia Gillard has promised to expand Medicare rebates to cover e-health consultations, particularly in rural and regional Australia.

Launching the ALP campaign in Brisbane on Monday, Ms Gillard said the National Broadband Network would transform the delivery of healthcare in regional and rural Australia.

“It is disturbing to me, it’s unacceptable to me, it’s offensive to me, that if you live in rural and regional Australia you are up to three times more likely to die within five years if you are diagnosed with cancer than other Australians,” she said.

“Well, I want to transform that. I want to transform it soon and I want to transform it for the future, relying on the National Broadband Network.”

As part of the $392 million package, Australians in rural and regional areas would be eligible for a special Medicare rebate for online consultations with health practitioners.

“They can see the health practitioner they need from the offices of their local General Practitioner rather than moving town, moving city, moving state, which is what has to happen now,” Ms Gillard said.

The expansion of the Medicare rebate would come into affect from July 1, 2011.

Ms Gillard also announced that from July 2012, the GP after-hours emergency helpline would include video conferencing.

“Instead of a voice at the other end of the line, there will be a person in your lounge room and you will be able to talk to them about that health emergency,” she said.

“This is the future of healthcare.”

Ms Gillard also announced financial incentives for GPs and specialists to introduce online services at a cost of $56.8 million. A further $35 million would be spent on training health professionals to use e-health technologies.

The policy proposal was welcomed by the Rural Doctors Association of Australia (RDAA), which has called on both sides of politics to commit to a number of rural health initiatives.

RDAA president Dr Nola Maxfield said the association had lobbied for e-health technology in regional Australia.

“We were asking for some incentives around the use of new technology and video conferencing, which were limited by the lack of Medicare rebates available,” Dr Maxfield told Government News.

“We welcome the funding to allow this to occur, to set it up within practices and to provide the training.”

Dr Maxfield said the new technologies would not replace local doctors and health professionals.

“This is something we’ve been asking for and we welcome it, but we do need to make sure there are still the doctors and nurses there on the ground to provide the basic health services,” she said.

Dr Maxfield said the new measures would prevent rural and regional patients from travelling great distances to access health services. Video conferencing, she added, would also allow doctors to “back-up” decisions with advice from other healthcare professionals.

The proposed policy was also welcomed by Australian Medical Association (AMA) president, Dr Andrew Pesce.

“This is a recognition of the need to embrace communications technology to modernise our health system,” he said.

“It will allow doctors to overcome the tyranny of distance when providing care and advice for patients in rural and remote Australia.”

Dr Pesce added that the AMA would also like to see a “corresponding commitment to attracting and retaining doctors in rural and remote communities to complement these important measures”.

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott was quick to attack Labor’s plan, claiming that the e-health initiatives were nothing new.

“We already have various health call centres,” Mr Abbott said.

“We already have, under the existing Medicare system, remote consultations.”

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