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The most charitable celebrities of 2011

Lady Gaga tops the list, after she launched the Born This Way Foundation, which aims to empower youth. Dosomething.org, who compiled the list, also recognised Lady Gaga’s AIDS/HIV advocacy work after she joined MAC cosmetics this year to create a  lipstick where 100 per cent of sales go towards the MAC AIDS fund.

Also on the list – pop singer Justin Bieber for launching the Believe Charity Drive, which benefits causes like music education and children’s cancer. George Clooney was also close to the top for his work advocating human rights in Sudan.

Click through the gallery for the full list of 20.

1. Lady Gaga (created the Born This Way Foundation and supports AIDS/HIV causes)

Fire that killed TV Chef Matt Golinski’s family not suspicious

There have been a few updates in this devastating story since we wrote about it here yesterday. Investigators say the fire was not suspicious – they believe Christmas lights or candles could be responsible for the fire that killed TV chef Matt Golinski’s wife and three daughters. Matt, who has appeared on Ready, Steady, Cook, suffered burns to 40 per cent of his body and has since undergone surgery. There’s been criticism of emergency services’ response to the incident – it took an ambulance 27 minutes to get to the scene – but the Queensland Emergency Services Minister said the first call was for a fire service, which arrived within 12 minutes. He said he was confident the service had done its best.

Andrew G and wife News: The most charitable celebrities of 2011

Andrew G has announced his split from wife Noa

Andrew G uses Twitter to announce marriage split.

Andrew Gunsberg, better known as Andrew G, has announced his split from wife Noa Tishby. The couple have been married for almost four years and have been living in Los Angeles. The radio and television presenter used Twitter to tell his folllowers of the breakup.

Noa tweeted the same words from her own account. They wrote “@noatishby & 1 are sad to say we’re mutually and amicably ending our marriage. We thank you for your support and ask for privacy and respect.”

“Thank you for your love and understanding. Please accept that we will have no further comments on this matter.”

After-hours GPs over hospitals?

A Government plan to have take pressure off hospital emergency departments has been criticised by health professionals, who say patients will lose valuable time if they need medical assistance. New Health Minister Tanya Plibersek yesterday announced extra funding for GP clinics to boost after-hours care, as well as a national roll out of a 24-hour medical helpline service. Ms Plibersek said: “In each circumstance, we’re trying to make it easier for people to talk to a GP or see a GP, because we know that a lot of people are turning up to the emergency department of hospitals when they would prefer to see a doctor.”

But Australian Medical Association president Steve Hambleton said the push would divert people from hospitals. “People often minimise their symptoms and there is a potential delay in people getting the right help they need which could make a difference,” he said.

471438 will the dog News: The most charitable celebrities of 2011

Kyza, or "Will"

Puppy survives 5-metre fall

The woman who allegedly threw her dog out of the window of a first-floor apartment has been refused bail. Eight-month old ridgeback-staffordshire cross Kyza was left with a broken leg, broken teeth and internal injuries after the incident. He has been since been nicknamed ‘Will’ by police for his determination to survive and is expected to make a full recovery.

 

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72 Comments so far

  1. GD Star Rating
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    Genevieve Joy

    That puppy is one of my puppy’s littermates :(

    I had to go and give my puppy an extra special cuddle after reading that.

    What really irks me is that people who treat animals that way tend to treat their small children the same (or worse).

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    Kitten

    Go little puppy, go! Live a wonderful, healthy life full of love – you are an incredible, and incredibly lucky, little being and you will find most people are nicer than that awful woman.

    Meanwhile, there is something seriously wrong with our society if that woman does not serve jail time and is ever allowed custody of an animal again…

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    Amandarose

    I recently returned to hospital work after ten years- Talk about more jargon and inefficient pen pushing. ten years ago magagement of each hospital was individual and things got done as the paper pushers knew the local needs and were in the best place to make decision. I was shocked how cumbersome and inefficient the system was. I was like the staff fed up of banging heads against had given up and were not working and full capacity.

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    Me!

    It’d be interesting to know what the actual dollar amount was these celebrities contributed to charity themselves. Or what percentage of their income was donated. It seems as though they are considered charitable because they put their name and their face to a foundation, which is a great thing as it obviously gets their fans donating but what has been their monetary contribution.

    Celebrities with their own charities/foundations make me feel a little icky, it sometimes seems as though their charity is used as a taxation tool and/or brand building exercise.

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    deborah

    Re: the GP after-hours service discussion, what is not stated in the article above is that the AMA is arguing that the hold-ups in hospitals are not caused by lower-severity cases (Category 4 and 5 patients) ‘clogging’ EDs, but by the inability of EDs to move more severely ill (Category 1 – 2 patients) from ED to the wards, because of bed unavailability. Basically if there are no beds available a patient who is too sick to leave the hospital has to wait in ED, where they can at least be attended to. Thus Steve Hambleton’s argument that trying to encourage more after-hours services by GPs won’t impact on the pointy end of the problem, but directing that funding to upgrades of hospitals and hospital staffing will.

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      Eternally

      Well explained Deborah, thanks

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      Susan As Well

      Disagree with this perspective. This is a narrow view of a much wider problem in healthcare that involves all stakeholders in the public and private sectors. To increase funding to one stakeholder, i.e. hospitals, will not make healthcare more widely accessible or move patients seamlessly through the system. Increasing hospital funding has been tried before and not been as successful as other initiatives based outside hospital care. Yes, you can have cat 1 -2 patients moved out of ED quicker but that leaves more room for the next lot of cat 1- 3 that come in (cat 3 is a potentially life threatening illness). Other patients don’t need or want to be in the ED/hospital environment. Increasing hospital funding just isn’t sound management of a health system that needs restructuring to meet demand that has changed dramatically since hospital care was the only care available to all and sundry when it was required.

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        lucindainthesky

        This argument is severely flawed. Hospitals have never had their funding increased enough to make a noticable difference. We all know that hospitals are painfully understaffed accross the board, not just in ED. The people taking up beds in ED for a long period of time are there because there are no beds to move them into in a ward, as has been brought up. There aren’t that many people in the ED for really minor things, I think the average person with a bit of common sense would just wait for the GP the next morning. The other point is, what constitutes too minor to be in the emergency department anyway? It’s a fine line really. For example if someone cuts themselves badly and needs stitches, should they go to an after hours GP and wait for hours while losing blood? Because if the busy GP has to rush them ahead of everyone else anyway, then they may as well be treated at emergency where they can get a tetanus shot straight away, an xray if it might be broken etc. And if they are not bleeding profusely and the wound is not badly gaping, then I’m fairly certain anyone with common sense would apply pressure, cover it, raise it, and see a GP the next day if they need to. While I am sure it couldn’t hurt to have a few more after hours facilities, I can’t see it being the magic bullet people seem to think it will be. I am just not really clear about which cases are supposed to be sent to the all hours GP?

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          Susan As Well

          Rather difficult to ascertain what you are actually trying to say Lucinda … are you speaking from a research perspective or personal experience as a health professional or a consumer?

          Your best bet would be to call a nurse advice line if you don’t know what cases can be treated by a GP. Seriously, you need to put “end rant” after this post.

          There are no magic bullet solutions in GP after hours care, just as increasing hospital funding is not a magic bullet either. The healthcare system is just too complex. If there is to be any solution that will work, it is one where the stakeholders (doctors, nurses, governments, ancillary hospital staff, consumer groups etc) work together to bring out the best in the system for the least money spent. Focusing on hospital funding alone denies the opportunity to do this and isolates each sector from the other so that costs increase. Similarly, where one sector makes divisive comments about another sector, the entire system becomes weaker and less able to take advantage of the strengths of all the stakeholders. The end result is suboptimal use of valuable resources, suboptimal healthcare and decreased patient safety and welfare. What we have now, in other words.

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      Lu

      I have been told by someone in the medical profession that the biggest problem is the elderly. There arent enough aged care facilities available and many hospital beds are being taken up by the elderly who are unable to access nursing home care.

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        Kris2040

        When Nan was in hospital leading up to her dying, she wasn’t actually “sick” but needed full time nursing care. The hospitals were on Mum and my uncles’ backs for them to get her into nursing homes. Not subtle about it, and they really pushed them. We understood the pressure the hospitals were under, but it was horrible all the same.

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    Mizzy

    Does Lea Michele’s (or anyone’s) work with PETA really count as charitable? In my opinion PETA doesn’t really do much for animal (or women’s) welfare.

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    Anonymous

    Look at that poooooor adorable beautiful puppy! How could anyone throw it out the window!

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    odette

    It’s hardly charitable for Miley Cyrus to assist people to get hearing aids. She’s only gong to deafen them again with her caterwauling.

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    Essie

    She threw her PUPPY out the WINDOW? Crazy effing BITCH I hope she rots in jail!

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    Scarletashes

    I am definitely all about the after hours GP services. Just before Christmas my grandmother was admitted to hospital with a chest infection and released on the 23rd. By the evening of the 24th, my uncle who is we carer had gotten sick too. No after hours clinics open at all, thank goodness the home call doctor was able to visit. That took a six hour wait, but at least it was in the comfort of their own home. Finding antibiotics from an open pharmacist over christmas, much harder to organise!

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    Amy

    You shouldn’t be charitable just so you can get recognition or boost your career from it. These celebrities are worth millions for doing relatively little you would expect them to be charitable and we don’t really need to hear about it like it’s some kind of competition.

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      JosieY

      How do you know they do relatively little? Isn’t the fact that by celebrating them we publicize their charity worth something? Does it matter to the people they help how much money they have? I want to ask a pointed question about how much YOU do for charity, but that would be rude. So I won’t.

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      Eternally

      I like hearing about people doing good things, celebrity or not.

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    loves2bake

    I think the after hours GPs are a fantastic idea. I don’t buy into the AMAs argument since it will merely mimic the options that are available during the day. It also means that for lower category illnesses you can get in a set line, rather than having to keep being bumped by higher categories arriving in the ED which is why the wait is sometimes hours. There are plenty of times I would have loved to have access to an after hours GP – particularly when my baby son is screaming at 3am and I’m not sure if it is an ear infection.

    Obviously there are logistical considerations but, as an idea, I think it has the potential to be a win-win for the hospital which is overrun by non-serious cases and those patients. If they base them at the hospitals, it also means that triage can encourage the lower category patients to go to the GP instead in order to be seen quicker.

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    elli

    After hours clinics are a good idea but, as a receptionist for one GP and sister of another, I wonder who’s going to staff them?

    Only the more affluent areas of major cities have enough GPs to staff daytime demand – even the western suburbs of Sydney are understaffed, let alone rural areas (“Rural” in this context includes the NSW south and north coasts.)

    So if as many doctors as are available are working during the day, who’s going to work at night?

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      Amandarose

      Money would have to be good- Alot of G.P mums might be happy to do an evening while their husband is home with the kids. Younger G.P’s saving to buy their own practice- I think it could work if enough money in thrown at it. The number of medical students is very high right now so in the next 5 years I think we should be seeing more doctors about

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    lucindainthesky

    I am not entirely sure about this after hours GP funding thing. A HUGE number of people in the emergency department at night are there because of alcohol related brawls and getting stomach pumped, drink spiking etc. They tend to clog a large chunk of the ambulance/paramedic time as well, and this won’t change because drunk people can’t drive. I also think most towns/suburbs have a 24 medical centre anyway, which clearly doesn’t do much to ease the load of the emergency department, or the hospital. I think the funding would be better spent on campaigns and strategies to change the binge drinking phenomenon, and also to properly fund the hospitals in the first place. Hospitals are so horribly short staffed in all areas – and funding after hours GPs won’t be able to fix it in my opinion. I really think they need to address underfunding of hospitals at the root. More after hours GP service might ease the EDs slightly, but I think it is a bandaid fix. Just my opinion.

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      Eve

      The 24 HR medical centers don’t appear to exist anymore – recently my father was bitten by a cat & I couldn’t find an open medical centre in our area (inner Western suburbs of Sydney). I didn’t want to send him to Emergency, which I think should be reserved for emergencies, but did so as some cat bites can be fatal within 24 hrs. This was not the first time we needed after hours care so I think there is a real need.

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      alnmum

      I have posted about this before and I agree with lucindainthesky. Alcohol fuelled anything makes up a large portion of ED work and not just on the weekends. Emergency Department ‘bread & butter’ is generally abdo pain & chest pain. Picture this – the young woman of childbearing age with abdo pain – what could it be? Ectopic pregnancy? Gallstones? Appendicitis? Constipation? It could be anything and the right place for that person is the ED in order to be diagnosed properly.
      The after hours GP clinic at my local hospital ( a large regional very very busy ED) is a nonsense. They open at 7pm and have a pre determined number of patients they see. So, when the patient arrives, pays to park and arrives at the GP Clinic to find they are already full, where do they go? Up to the ED! There is a body of evidence to suggest that an after hours GP clinic can actually make the larger ED’s much busier.

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    Ella89

    After hours GP’s sounds like a great idea. I don’t know if it’s just in Melbourne or perhaps just my suburb but my doctor has an after hour service where you can get a home visit from a locum doctor at any time of the night (although usually there is a bit of a wait)
    I’ve had them come out a few times at 3am when I was younger with really bad ear infections and my ear drum has perfurated etc. It’s hardly an emergency but antibiotics/painkillers are needed asap.
    Surely the less people sitting in ED the better?

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    iamevilcupcake

    First of all, hello everyone :) Hope you had a good 4 days.

    Secondly, animal cruelty makes me want to turn into Batgirl and go vigilante on their ass. I absolutely loathe people who think it’s ok to abuse animals who can’t defend themselves.

    Lastly, the times that I’ve been in hospital, it has amazed me the amount of people who have come to ED and they actually don’t need too. If there were more options, I’m sure this would unclog ED a little.

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      Eternally

      I think the stress is on ‘a little’. Most of the ED crowding is due to bed block, where patients can’t be moved on to the ward because there is no bed. The ward beds are too often taken up by people waiting for nursing home or ‘slow stream’ rehab places. Yet politicians rarely make announcements about nursing home beds.
      Research confirms that GP type presentations are not a major cause of ED crowding (can’t link on phone sorry)

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        loves2bake

        The last time I was in the ED with my son there were four of us who had to sleep with our littlies in the kids ED room (which only has 6 beds) because there was no room for us on the kids ward. Which then meant there was no room for kids waiting in triage. Then when we finally got a bed for the next day and night there were empty beds everywhere – just no-one to staff them. There definitely needs to be more money invested in funding nurses particularly – so much money was thrown at the building industry to boost jobs, why couldn’t they have done the same for medical services?

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          Eternally

          Yes, that’s a good point, when we talk about “beds”, often it is not physical beds we are talking about, but the number of available beds, as beds will be “closed” if there are no nurses to look after a patient in them.

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          Kris2040

          They let you all stay in there at the expense of kids waiting to be triaged?

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            loves2bake

            I’m not sure what happened to the kids in the waiting room – like I said, I don’t know whether they took them to beds in other areas of the ED, but 4 out of the 6 beds in the paed ED were taken by kids who needed to be admitted to the hospital (my son being one of them). I ‘slept’ in the chair next to his bed – not in one of the beds!!!

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              Kris2040

              Ah that makes more sense! I read your original comment as your family slept in there!

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    stinkb0mb

    That story on that GORGEOUS Staffy x puppy made my blood boil last night! I watched it while I had my Staffy sat on one side of me on the couch & my Pitty on the other and I looked at them and remembered how small, vulnerable and TRUSTING them were as puppies [and still are] and it boggles my mind how ANYONE can do any harm to an animal that trusts us so much.

    I hope she gets sent to jail and is never allowed to own another animal ever again.

    Re the After-hours GP clinics – I think anything that keeps people away from hospital EDs is a good thing. EDs get clogged up with people who really just need to see a GP and so with these clinics, they will be able to do that and free the ED up for real emergencies that need hospital treatment.

    Sad to read about Andrew and Noa – I think any marriage breakup is sad. As for announcing it on Twitter, see no problem with it, they are just doing what an agent would have done in the past but now they bypass the agent and announce it themselves.

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    amyintheworld

    I think the idea of more after hours GPs would be great. There would always be someone willing to work nights instead of days, and apart from creating more jobs, it would take a lot of pressure off hospitals. My sister lives in Tasmania and has had to take her girls to the ED on numerous occasions for high fevers etc knowing that she’ll have to wait for hours on end because her kids aren’t in serious danger, but are sick enough to need a doctor. Usually by the time she sees a doc the fever has gone down and she feels silly. I know she’d love the choice to see an after hours GP! I hate the idea of clogging up an ED as well, but I’ve had to do on occasion.

    There really needs to be harsher laws for animal cruelty. My fiance’s father has a lovely labrador which he got from the pound about 7 or 8 years ago. They tried to convince him not to take him, as Simba was really vicious – they told my father in law that someone had taken a whippersnipper to the dog’s head! Luckily my father in law is pretty stubborn and he insisted he wanted him – it took a lot of patience and love, but you’d never guess Simba was ever vicious and traumatised (except when the lawnmower is on, he freaks out so we take him for a walk). The way my FIL talks, if he ever found the guy that did it, he’d rip him limb from limb!

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    Lana

    Anyone who throws a puppy out of a window belongs in jail in my opinion.

    Cannot imagine why ANYONE would be against plans to take pressure off our emergency departments. Of course we need more after hours GPs. So many of the cases presented to the ER just need a GP – I think it’s a brilliant initiative

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      amyintheworld

      I can *sort of* understand that there may be a concern that some people might go to a GP when it’s more serious – but I think that would be rare. Perhaps a advertising campaign could be released along with implementing more after hours GPs to explain to people that there’s still some things that they need to go to a hospital for (eg. chest pain, shortness of breath)?
      I was referred to the hospital after seeing a GP about severe pains in my gut and while I was there, there were at least 8 people in the waiting room who seemed to have no more than the sniffles.

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        lucindainthesky

        Amy I think most GPs would recognise when they have an emergency anyway, like you said. They will even ring an ambulance if they need to. I can’t see there being a problem, people occasionally get referred to hospital during business hours by a GP, so after hours wouldn’t be any different. That said, most towns and cities have 24hr medical centres anyway, but that doesn’t seem to ease the load of the emergency department at all. I think much of this funding would be better going into expanding emergency departments and funding extra staff. The hospitals are crying out for extra funding, and I’m not sure this a solution myself : -)

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    An Idle Dad

    My wife used the GP line on Christmas Day when our seven month old son spike a fever (again). Gets two thumbs up from me.

    There was no minimisation of symptoms from my son’s mother, I can assure you.

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      loves2bake

      I’ve found the HealthDirect number to have been an invaluable resource when I’m just not sure whether my children’s symptoms warrant a visit to the doctor/ED or just stay home. One late night call resulted in my son being rushed to the ED having an asthma attack – he was just breathing a little fast and was his normal happy self – I had no idea it was so serious. We were in hospital for 2 days and I now know what phrases like “accessory breathing”, “tracheal tug” and “ventolin responsive wheeze mean”

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    inkabinka

    I would want to see that woman NEVER be allowed to own ANY animal again- I am crying after reading that story.
    Our penalties just are NOT harsh enough when it comes to animal cruelty.. I’m glad she didn’t get bail, but bet she just gets a slap on the wrist too.

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      Fi

      Agreed. Animals are vulnerable, cruelty must be punished.

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    Rayn

    How anyone could deliberately do anything to hurt that beautiful little puppy is horrifically unthinkable.

    I sincerely hope his owner is punished harshly…the consequences for animal cruelty in this country are so often not serious enough.

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    MJ

    Extended hour GP services are EXACTLY what we need!!!!! I think this is fantastic news!
    Steve Hambleton you are a stupid, stupid man. How can anyone working in the healthcare system possibly think this is a bad idea??? Has he worked in an emergency department?? Does he even vaguely understand the problems in the health care system?
    This is the problem in the healthcare system. People who have power are so out of touch with what is going on, they make stupid statements and stupid decisions that just fuck everything up even more.
    Apart from chest pain or severe, very rare conditions like meningococcal, the GP can handle much of what presents at emergency safely, by either treating and sending the patient home (colds, minor injuries, child fevers, – which account for a LOT of ED patients) – and thereby stopping those patients from needlessly clogging up emergency, or send the things that need to go to ED (suspected appendixes or other serious abdominal conditions, people who are really unwell and need IV antibiotics/hospital care (ie old people with pneumonia, kids that are very unwell, etc) and can call an ambulance for the chest pains etc who need need treatment NOW and should have gone to ED or called an ambulance immediately.
    It would be very few people who would genuinely need category two URGENT assessment or people who should have called an ambulance (ie chest pains, shortness of breath, shock patients, etc) who would be silly enough to go to a GP, and 99% of the time they will be picked by the receptionist as needing to see the GP immediately or needing an ambulance, so very little time would be wasted at the GP, and a lot of the time the GP would be starting treatment (aspirin, ECG, or injected antibiotics for suspected meningococcal (which is SO rare) before the ambulance even gets there.
    In addition 24 hour advice lines staffed by nurses and the new ones staffed by doctors are an excellent tool for people who are unsure if they should go to ED right now or can go to a GP, or even wait until tomorrow.
    This is the best news for our healthcare system, this is exactly what we need, and it makes me furious that someone in that position can make that statement. He needs to either back up his opinions with solid facts about why it’s dangerous, or shut up and let the people who actually work in the hospitals and know what they’re doing do their job.

    End of rant. I feel better now. :-)

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      Susan As Well

      I tend to agree re Steve Hambleton. This christmas, my son and I have been disgustingly ill with a gastro virus. I was able to take both of us to a new Nurse Practitioner clinic, receive a prescription for maxolon and med certs for both of us for work and get a professional opinion about what was wrong with us (even though I am an experienced RN I hadn’t had a gastro virus for years so needed to check and I can’t write my own med cert or scripts).

      Steve Hambleton was in the local papers outraged when this clinic opened and the skies were going to fall in because he stated that the clinic wasn’t “safe” or run by doctors. I really dislike that he encourages a divide between nurses and doctors by saying nurses aren’t safe. The evidence, once again, is overwhelming that nurses are very safe and with training up to Practitioner level can safely, effectively and economically manage minor illnesses, suturing, prescriptions and order investigations.

      There just isn’t enough medical staff for the community’s health for Steve Hambleton to be elitist about doctors being the only health professionals who can treat unwell people.

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        Kris2040

        Is it just me or does he seem to be against anything? I don’t remember Kerryn Phelps being so anti everything.

        I don’t understand why they don’t have dedicated GPs at Emergency Depts for after hours, so if you’re just sick and need a script you can go and not clog up the place for actual emergencies. If you need to be referred on or admitted, they can do that. Otherwise you can go and be on your way.

        Why the head of the doctors’ union would want to continue the overwork for his members doesn’t make sense.

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          Susan As Well

          The AMA has traditionally existed to protect doctor’s interests which is also supposed to have an indirect effect of protecting patient’s interests which can often be the case. The AMA is also notorious for being a closed shop and making access into medicine and specialties so difficult as to be almost impossible. It does contribute to doctor shortages … cynics might say the reason is so doctors’ incomes are not threatened rather than the safety and welfare of patients … with all due respect to doctors who manage the difficulties of making an income balanced against meeting the needs of their patients and the community.

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            Kris2040

            Yeah I know they’re there to protect doctors’ interests, I don’t have an issue with them having collective representation at all. I just wonder how many doctors are cringing when he pipes up saying “NO! Don’t like it! Won’t work!”. I know they were against Nurse practitioners, but I just don’t see how keeping it SO restricted benefits them.
            I don’t doubt they generally care about patients and their health, but his attitude just smacks of selfishness and saying NO! for the sake of it to me. Kind of like Tony Abbott.

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            Anonymous

            Much more of the AMA’s work is on public health and protecting patient’s interests, than on looking after Doctor’s income. Compare the work of the AMA to the ANF. The Doctor’s award is up for negotiation in Victoria at the same time as the nurses, but the level of publicity and industrial action is not in the same ball park. And before anyone comes back with ‘doctors are paid way more’, for many years both award wage rises and Medicare rebates have been well below inflation.
            (I support the nurses’ pay claim BTW, am just responding in defense of AMA & Dr bashing)

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              Kris2040

              No-one’s doctor bashing or saying doctors don’t deserve what they’re paid. That’s a bit of a strawman argument.

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              Susan As Well

              Disagreeing with the views of the AMA as expressed by Steve Hambleton is not doctor bashing or AMA bashing.

              Steve Hambleton needs to seriously consider what he puts in the media or he could rightly be accused of nurse bashing and continuing to undermine moves towards safe and timely healthcare.

              Take the issue back to Steve Hambleton to open up discussion that looks for solutions rather than stifle any progress to meeting the community’s health needs by stating that nurses are unsafe and doctors are safe.

              If nurses are so unsafe, one wonders how doctors can leave their patients in the care of nurses at all.

              Pot. Kettle. Black.

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    Anonymous

    Hope that woman gets into jail , what a fuck .

    Also Andrew G , you ask got privacy yet announce your split over twitter ? Jesus .

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      Kris2040

      How is announcing it over Twitter and asking for privacy any different to a publicist/agent doing it? If they do it from their own Twitter accounts, it stops rumours and they are in control.

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        Haven Maven

        I just think it’s sad that any breakup needs to be announced publicly at all.

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          Anonymous

          Agreed. Why do they feel the need to announce it, sooner or later it will be known.

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    Lil

    We have a twenty four hour nurse help line here in Victoria as well as a maternal health line. I have called both on occasion and been forced to wait more than an hour to speak with someone. Each conversation has ended in advice to either visit a doctor or go to emergency. Delaying the inevitable! I would like to see some evidence that medical help lines work before more tax dollars are expended. On a positive note the maternal health line does provide a valuable counselling and support service for anxious or worried mums and can be very helpful but it does not replace the need for a doctor when medical attention is required.

    Do other states have these services?

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      Kris2040

      Yep. If you call our Baby health centre, the answering machine message refers you to your blue book for support contacts, and A & E if it’s an emergency.

      I’ve never had to use any of the lines, but certainly know about them.

      Mum said the hospital she works at (she’s in radiology at the private hospital next to the public hospital) has had a GP clinic attached to Emergency for about 5 years. She knows this because they do xrays and stuff for them in her work. She said the local GPs do a rotation of one night a month or fortnight or something, works great.

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      Anonymous

      Every state has them. There is evidence that they work, but unfortunately due to them being government run and staffed by nurses there is always a staff shortage, therefore long waits. Also a lot of these services are getting more busy really quickly, so they’re short staffed and not recruiting the bare minimum of staff fast enough. However the statistics say most of the advice is not to seek urgent care but wait for the doctor in the next few days or see how it goes, and advice about how to manage at home is given. You could think of it as delaying the inevitable, but I think it’s useful. People who call are usually either really under estimating or really over estimating how soon they need a doctor, and are often giving incorrect treatments (for example fever management) at home. So from an education point of view it’s very helpful, and hopefully once staffing levels catch up with demand, there will not be such long waits (I know in other states when it’s really busy the wait time is 25 minutes at the very longest, never an hour).
      These services do save lives, mostly people not realizing their chest pain is a heart attack, or their baby is REALLY sick and needs treatment now.
      They are most useful for people who aren’t very savvy with their health education, for people who are pretty on the ball it’s really just confirming the idea they had in mind.

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      Susan As Well

      I’ve just completed 18 mths postgrad study on nurse advice lines and the evidence is overwhelming that they work well but it depends what you mean by work.

      The services arrived in Australia after being successful in the UK and the US. Most people do not understand that nurse advice lines are not diagnostic, i.e. nurses cannot diagnose your symptoms through a telephone assessment. What nurses can do is triage. They can sort through the severity of your symptoms and either give you advice that you can use to treat yourself at home or advise you what level of medical care you may need with life-threatening symptoms requiring ambulance transport to hospital right down to see your GP within a week or so.

      Where you were advised by a nurse to go to ED or your GP means that you should seek further medical assessment and treatment not just stay at home and hope that “it will pass”. This is the question that most people need answered about a health problem, as much as the diagnosis, so, yes, they work from this perspective.

      Australia is now linking nurse advice lines to GP services, as in the UK and the US so that ultimately it will be possible for you to ring a nurse advice line and have the nurse arrange for medical care by a doctor, either by speaking to the doctor on the phone, a house visit or a surgery visit arranged.

      Whether there will be enough nurses and doctors to staff the services is the big question. If there is they will “work”. If there isn’t who knows?

      Currently, nurses are graduating this year with a severe shortage of graduate placements in hospitals so they will not be able to acquire the experience they need to work on a nurse advice line. The situation is critical for public health outcomes. I’m not sure what is happening with doctors currently.

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        Eternally

        Sounds like your research will be very useful, i hope policy-makers take note. I was a bit skeptical about Nurse-oncall initially, but I agree it has it’s role as a triage and perhaps first aid advice service.

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    Becnherboys

    Who could do that to a puppy??? The poor little thing :(
    I think the funding for GP’s is a good thing. In the past year we have twice attended emergency when we really only needed a GP. Unfortunately I doubt it will be small towns who will benefit from it. Afterall extra $$$ does not make extra Doctors!
    The Golinski story is so terribly sad. I have heard the ambos were attending to drunks elsewhere and couldn’t get there. I cannot imagine the physical and emotional pain Matt is in right now.
    As for Andrew G it must be a slow, slow, slow news day for anyone to care!

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      Angie

      My partner works at Noosa Hospital, where the ambulance stopped briefly to pick up a doctor for the drive to Nambour, as there was only the one ambulance officer and policeman driving.

      Part of the problem is that the Sunshine Coast is very long and skinny, with Noosa at the very north end. It’s 45 minute drive from caloundra, almost halfan hour to Maroochydore and 20 mins to Nambour. If that is where the ambulances were, there isn’t much that can be done about it. There was an extra ambulance unit on duty that night. It’s just tragic.

      I work at a school in Nambour, And we recently needed an ambulance for a student due to a seizure, and it took over 25 mins to arrive as all the ambulances were on the coast.

      It’s a problem that we face on the Coast, with big distances and a spread out population. It’s tragic in this situation, but also didnt change the outcome.