Dr WOODRUFF – Thank you. I’ve got a bunch of questions, Premier, following on from previous annual reports and Estimates committees around ambulance ramping times, which have continued to worsen which is really concerning. You might need to possibly take some of these questions on notice; I’ll leave it to you to work out. Could you please provide some figures for this current financial year, or do you want to bring someone to the table?
Mr ROCKLIFF – Dr Woodruff, have you asked all the questions you wanted to ask of Dr Veitch?
Dr WOODRUFF – Yes, for the moment, I think so. Thanks, Dr Veitch.
Mr ROCKLIFF – I could invite Jordan Emery up to the table –
Dr WOODRUFF – Good idea.
Mr ROCKLIFF – and congratulate him on his appointment as the new chief executive of Ambulance Tasmania.
Dr WOODRUFF – That has been formalised, has it? Congratulations.
Mr ROCKLIFF – Yes, very good.
Dr WOODRUFF – So in this financial year, by hospital, can you please tell me the percentage of patients arriving by ambulance who are transferred within 15 minutes of arrival and within 30 minutes of arrival, and the median amount of time a person waits to offload at each of the hospitals?
Mr ROCKLIFF – While we see if we can find that information. I’ve got some numbers here that might be of assistance.
Dr WOODRUFF – Only if it’s that stuff, thanks, because I am just conscious of the time. I am happy to take it on notice, I don’t need to hear more information you have, we can drown in it. I just want to know that information, thank you.
Mr ROCKLIFF – All right. Jordan, do you have the information that Dr Woodruff is seeking, or would you like to take this on notice?
Ms MORGAN-WICKS – While Jordan is looking to find that specific data, just noting on the transfer of care metric, which is unfortunately not recorded in the ROGS data for ambulance across Australia, but based on the AMA report card, Tasmania was second-best to NSW for transfer of care within 30 minutes, noting that the AMA reported us at 79.6 per cent transferred within 30 minutes, compared to NSW which was 84.8 per cent, but Jordan may have some more specific transfer-of-care data points.
Dr WOODRUFF – The specific things were by hospital, percentage transferred within 15 minutes and percentage transferred within 30 minutes of arrival.
Mr ROCKLIFF – Okay. I hope I’m reading this correctly. The Royal Hobart Hospital ambulance presentations in total –
Dr WOODRUFF – Arrivals?
Mr ROCKLIFF – from July 2022 to March 2023 were 19 092. The percentage transferred within 15 minutes was 52.2 per cent; percentage transferred within 30 minutes was 59.8 per cent; the number ramped was 9135; and the hours ramped were 17 837. If I go to the 2021-22 figures, the percentage transferred within 15 minutes was 57.4 per cent; percentage transferred within 30 minutes was 65.75 per cent; and the numbers ramped were 10 815.
For the LGH, ambulance presentations from July to year to date were 11 023. The percentage transferred within 15 minutes was 56.9 per cent; percentage transferred within 30 minutes was 62.7 per cent; the number ramped was 4753; and the hours ramped were 12 581.
For the North West Regional Hospital, ambulance presentations to March this year were 6113. The percentage transferred within 15 minutes was 78.6 per cent; percentage transferred within 30 minutes was 86.4 per cent; the number ramped was 1308; and hours ramped were 830. It seems to be a pretty reasonable improvement based on last year, although there are three months to go.
For the Mersey Community Hospital, ambulance presentations to March this year were 3615. The percentage transferred within 15 minutes was 86.4 per cent; percentage transferred within 30 minutes was 91.5 per cent; the number ramped was 490; and hours ramped were 280.
Jordan, do you have any more specific data on that?
Mr EMERY- I can provide some additional information statewide and by hospital on the average time in hospital, particularly since December last year.
Dr WOODRUFF – I was interested in the percentiles, the median wait time for a patient affected by offload delays for each of the hospitals. I wonder what the median wait time and the seventy-fifth and the ninetieth percentiles.
Mr ROCKLIFF – I think Mr Webster has some information here.
Dr WOODRUFF – Excellent.
Mr WEBSTER – It may save time in that this is available on the Health dashboard and can be split by hospital and by categories of patient, but I can read it out.
Dr WOODRUFF – By the percentiles?
Dr VEITCH – No, this is the median number of minutes you asked for.
Dr WOODRUFF – The median wait time, yes, for fiftieth percentile, the seventy-fifth percentile and the ninetieth percentile.
Mr WEBSTER – On the website we do the fiftieth percentile and we do it by category, by month and by hospital, so do you want me to go through that?
Dr WOODRUFF – Is that for ramping?
Mr WEBSTER – This is the median time for transfer from the ambulance into the hospital.
Dr WOODRUFF – Yes, so the length of wait time.
Mr WEBSTER – Yes. I can read it out but it is available on the Health dashboard now.
Dr WOODRUFF – I am interested the ramping times.
Mr WEBSTER – The wait time is transfer of care delay time.
Dr WOODRUFF – So from turning up at the hospital in an ambulance to being actually admitted into the emergency department, not into the interior room but actually as an admitted ED patient.
Mr WEBSTER – Yes. Again, the wait time on the website is that time – it’s not as in arriving at the hospital, it’s the time from arrival to when you are seen to be admitted. As I said, I could read it out, but it is available and broken down on the website.
Dr WOODRUFF – Just to be clear, I am not talking about general people turning up to emergency departments. I am talking about people turning up in an ambulance. Not ED arrivals but ambulance.
Dr VEITCH – I don’t think we have that.
Dr WOODRUFF – That’s right, but it is available. That is what I am asking for. Is that possible, Justin?
Mr EMERY – Jordan.
Dr WOODRUFF – Jordan, I beg your pardon. Can we get that on notice then?
CHAIR – I am sorry, I thought he was going to take it on notice.
Dr WOODRUFF – The question was, can I put that on notice because it isn’t available on the dashboard but I know it is collected?
Mr ROCKLIFF – Yes, absolutely.
Dr WOODRUFF – Minister, one of the reasons Ms Dow and I are asking you these detailed questions is because it is not available in the Dashboard data and there’s less information there than there used to be. One of the things I’ve asked you –
Mr ROCKLIFF – Is there?
Dr WOODRUFF – Yes. A lot of information disappeared about five years ago. I think you might remember, Rebecca? We talked about that. Here we go, we asked this question in Estimates –
Mr ROCKLIFF – We’re increasing them. We’re completing monthly data.
Dr WOODRUFF – You have gone back to monthly data.
Mr ROCKLIFF – No, no.
Dr WOODRUFF – It always used to be monthly. You stopped that.
Mr ROCKLIFF – No.
Dr WOODRUFF – Yes, you did.
Mr ROCKLIFF – No.
Dr WOODRUFF – You weren’t Health minister; Mr Ferguson was.
CHAIR – Order, Dr Woodruff.
Mr ROCKLIFF – It was never monthly data. We were the first government to have the Dashboard, which was quarterly. The previous government of which you weren’t part of, I accept that, we had to RTI the outpatient waiting list, for example. We’ve been very open and transparent and increasingly. It is now monthly.
Dr WOODRUFF – Let’s talk about being more open and transparent. I asked you about Code Blue data last year on ramps, which is like a medical emergency. You said you weren’t able to tell us. Are you able to tell us the number of Code Blue events for ramped patients in the last financial year at each of the hospitals?
Prof LAWLER – If I understand the question correctly, it was seeking specific data around Code Blue in each of the hospitals?
Dr WOODRUFF – On the ramp.
Prof LAWLER – I’m not sure that the information is gathered to that level of granularity. My understanding is that in the process of capturing deteriorating patients and the response, which is part of our response to standard 8, we have MET call or Code Blue databases in our hospitals that capture the information. I understand that it is captured to the point of department or unit location rather than the granularity of cubicle or treatment space. It’s also worth noting that it’s frequently the case within emergency departments that responses to arrest or sudden deterioration may actually simply be through local activation rather than a hospital-based Code Blue activation. If we capture hospital-based Code Blue, an emergency department response may not be captured through that process. I wouldn’t say that we would have the information to that level of granularity to hand.
Dr WOODRUFF – Okay. Can I get clarification through you, minister? Are you confident you do not collect information and cannot provide us with information on the ramp, not elsewhere in ambulances but on the ramp, on the number of Code Blues that are called. That is, medical emergencies that happen on the ramp before a person is admitted into the emergency department? Why do we not know this? We have been asking about this for years.
Is it possible to get that information or do you just not want to provide it?
Mr ROCKLIFF – I’ve been very open and transparent with that data.
Dr WOODRUFF – I know it is called; it must be recorded?
Mr EMERY- I suppose, Dr Woodruff, it’s conceivable that some data might be available in a Safety Reporting and Learning System (SRLS), but not specifically as it relates to Code Blues. There might be occurrences where a Code Blue is called and a patient has had a simple faint or syncope, and that data might not necessarily be captured in the SRLS if there was not any particular harm to the patient.
Dr WOODRUFF – Okay. Mr Emery, is it something Ambulance Tasmania could look at collecting? Code Blues wouldn’t be called for somebody for light reasons, they’re for medical emergencies, like imminent life-threatening situations or potentially so. Can that be collected?
Mr ROCKLIFF – That’s something we could consider, Dr Woodruff, as we upgrade our digital health system for example, and that data then can be much more accessible.
Dr WOODRUFF – Okay, thank you. How many SLRS, which is what Mr Emery referred to, have been made regarding situations in offload delay, or ramping, in this financial year, and how does that compare with the previous three financial years?
Prof LAWLER – One of the things I will highlight is the way we capture information through the SLRS. I take your point, Dr Woodruff; code blues aren’t necessarily called for the kind of situations that Mr Emery has highlighted. But, it’s important to note that Mr Emery has highlighted what we know of a situation at the end of a medical emergency, and code blues are called at the beginning. So, it may well be that code blues are called for any reason for a change in conscious state, or a change in observations, that may ultimately result in something that might not be as serious as otherwise considered.
We capture safety events of a very broad nature within the SLRS, and they are captured through a number of different categorisations: service delivery infrastructure – and certainly sometimes issues relating to ambulance off-load delay are captured in that, because there is a perception that they relate to infrastructure or service delivery matters; workplace health and safety; and what we describe as patient-client events, which are the adverse safety events that we tend to capture for clinical issues that arise during the delivery of care. One our challenges is that the current system that we use is a little bit difficult to search through.
As I mentioned, we can capture on the basis of where a patient is from a unit area, and it may well be that a patient on the ramp might be categorised as being within the emergency department, or they might be categorised as being under the care of ambulance. Similarly, there may not be an entry within that, that says a code blue was called, or the patient collapsed, or had a cardiac arrest. They are very different in terms of both the entry of information pertaining to the event, and also the outcome of the event. It is very difficult within the system we currently have to pull out the information you are describing.
We are in the process of procuring a replacement program for our safety reporting and learning system which will have a much greater level of granularity and searchability in order to provide us with greater intelligence about such things.
Dr WOODRUFF – Thank you, Professor Lawler. Minister what I am hearing, and what I have heard for years when I have asked this question, is that it’s too hard. It’s too difficult, we can’t get that granularity. More and more people are being ramped for longer amounts of time in Tasmania. There is no doubt that people are dying from ambulances not coming on time; or dying because they can’t get a bed in hospital; or dying while they’re ramped without being able to access even the emergency department services.
If we don’t collect the information about what’s happening, how can we have a situation that responds and improves what is going on? If you don’t even know how many people are having code blue events or any other emergency or any other problems in ambulances, then how can we respond? It’s almost as though you don’t want to know. What are we doing to collect the information to understand the increasingly large number of people in life-threatening conditions that are left outside of a hospital, unable to access medical emergency services – including, I need to say, for Mrs Schramm who died not even getting a bed, or any palliative care or dignity. What are we doing to make sure that no-one else suffers that indignity and the death that she did?
Ms MORGAN-WICKS – We absolutely do care about adverse patient outcomes that occur across all of our hospitals, and Professor Lawler has detailed our safety risk and learning system, our SLRS system-
Dr WOODRUFF – You can’t provide it to me.
Mrs MORGAN-WICKS – which has recently been upgraded to provide information. We have been very open in terms of our digital health transformation program, which is some $475 million over the next ten years, which we are investing to upgrade legacy and ageing health, digital infrastructure. We work together with each of our partners – for example, ASIM – in the collection of indicator data within our EDs and have committed to the ASIM indicators in terms of length of wait. We also publish a significant amount of data in the ROGS each year, noting that this is a problem, not just in Tasmania but in every single state and territory in Australia.
Dr WOODRUFF – Will you commit, minister, by the next Estimates to being able to answer all these questions? Your Government has had years where I’ve heard, ‘Oh, it’s really hard’. The data is there; they’re not being collected. Meanwhile, people are dying. These may be avoidable situations – of course they might be – but they can’t be responded to if we don’t know what’s going on. You don’t know what’s going on.
Mr ROCKLIFF – I accept that each adverse event is responded to.
Dr WOODRUFF – By calling the Coroner when someone dies. That’s often what happens. You didn’t answer my question. Could you commit to having that information available, instead off into the never never?
Mr ROCKLIFF – Yes, I’ll answer your question. Professor Lawler, on that last point.
Prof LAWLER – I make two observations. I don’t believe there is an acceptable rate of cardiac arrest or medical event which would prompt us to work harder to address ambulance ramping or offload delay. We recognise that there is not only a challenge with respect to the volume and number of ambulances ramped, but there is a clear body of evidence that indicates that there is a potential increase for adverse events in the presence of ramping. That’s why we have undertaken a number of processes and reform initiatives, including the process for escalating concerns around ambulance ramping. Mr Emery and hospital leaders have worked on that over the last three to four months to ensure that both patients and their families, and also staff members, are able to appropriately escalate their concerns to those individuals within the health system that have the authority to give effect.
There is also clear work around the transfer of care policies in which there is a marker and a clear process delineated – much in line with what occurs within New South Wales – to address and escalate, not only to ensure patients are off the ramp and into cubicles earlier but also to ensure that ambulances are free and available to respond in a timely fashion to priority zero calls.
I consider it’s also quite incorrect to indicate that our sole response to adverse events is to call the Coroner when people die. We certainly do call the Coroner when people die, and it’s appropriate to report such cases to the Coroner in line with the act. We have an entire safety event management policy that is utilised across all of our publicly-funded health services in order to identify, categorise, investigate and respond appropriately to adverse events, not only when harm is occasioned to a patient but also when a near-miss occurs, so that we can learn the lessons and reform and advise our care delivery and structural processes.
This results in hundreds of recommendations every year. It results in root cause analysis and London Protocol investigations of SAC1 and SAC2 events, respectively. We have reporting requirements on the health services around the time limits within which they have to provide an initial update and a final response. We have regular meetings across our health services to ensure that those recommendations are not only noted but implemented.
There is a comprehensive process of safety event management monitoring and response that leads to better and safer care for Tasmanians.
Dr WOODRUFF – You can’t tell us what’s happening, because you don’t provide the data outside the hospital.
Ms DOW – Premier, when will the station and clinical services master plan that you committed at last Estimates to release in November of last year be made public, and how many positions does it say that we are short with paramedics across the state?
Mr ROCKLIFF – Which master plan?
Ms DOW – Station and clinical services master plan – the OHRC report.
Mr ROCKLIFF – Thank you for the question. We are investing at record levels across our health system including Ambulance Tasmania (AT). In April this year, a median emergency response time as of 1 June 2023 was 13.8 minutes. This is the shortest time in 18 months, and I commend all our hardworking paramedics on that result.
In relation to our commitment to employ an additional 48 paramedics across the state, I can confirm this was achieved ahead of time. We didn’t stop there. Last year’s budget also included funding for an additional 11 paramedics between Sorell and Huonville. We have also invested in new infrastructure, with 21 new ambulance vehicles commissioned over the last financial year, and we are continuing to work to build new stations across the state, including Bridgewater, which I was pleased to be at the opening of just a few weeks ago.
Given we were able to recruit the additional paramedics ahead of time, this meant our review of ambulance service demand could also be brought forward. Ambulance Tasmania engaged ORH to conduct a 10-year review. ORH specialises in taking an evidence-based approach to forecast future demand rates for emergency services such as Ambulance Tasmania, and today I can table a final report from ORH.
The modelling in the report was based on achieving a potential target median emergency response time of 10 minutes in urban areas and 15 minutes in rural areas over the next 10 years. Work will now occur to understand from a process improvement resourcing and infrastructure perspective what would be required for Ambulance Tasmania to reach this target by 2031 32. This is a journey we need to take our employees on with us and, as such, the department will be consulting our staff and volunteers on whether this target is appropriate and achievable given the details set out in the report.
The report also proposes three primary mechanisms to improve response performance through until 2031 32, including process improvements such as activation times, mobilisation times, time on scene, time at hospital and number of calls managed through secondary triage. Furthermore, the report proposes four potential new locations under the heading of ‘location optimisation’, including Legana, Cygnet, Sandy Bay and Snug.
The final proposed recommendation is to further enhance frontline resourcing, including through options such as expanded community paramedic positions and increased resourcing in identified geographic locations to respond to increasing demand over the next decade. The proposed enhancements will require careful consideration and staging, including new infrastructure, phased equipment to accommodate graduate paramedics and an assessment of operational and volunteering models to support service delivery changes.
The department will now work closely with staff, unions and our volunteers to seek feedback on the report and to create our 10-year master plan. Structured information sharing and consultation sessions will be facilitated by the Ambulance Tasmania executive team over the coming weeks and I encourage all our valuable and valued employees who are interested to participate.
Chair, I have Ambulance Tasmania’s final report by ORH titled Plan, Prepare, Perform that I have just spoken of and I will table that officially for everyone’s consumption.
Dr WOODRUFF – Minister, is it true that there are plans being discussed for shipping containers to be used as ramp space while development work at the hospital is underway?
Mr ROCKLIFF – Are you speaking about the Royal Hobart Hospital?
Dr WOODRUFF – Yes.
Mr ROCKLIFF – Mr Gregory, can you verify the question?
Mr GREGORY – Through you, minister, there is quite a bit of work to do in laying out the staging for redevelopment at the Royal. I’m not aware that there are any plans to use shipping containers.
Dr WOODRUFF – No? Okay.
Can you provide us with some information from Ambulance Tasmania? Maybe, Mr Emery will be able to provide it. It might be too detailed to give to the committee. It could be on notice if that would work?
Mr ROCKLIFF – What you are about to ask?
Dr WOODRUFF – Yes, it’s in relation to shifts within Ambulance Tasmania by shift type – like, day shift, afternoon shift, night shift, and by region. My question for the last financial year is how many shifts have gone unfilled by paramedics, by shift type and by region?
Mr EMERY – Dr Woodruff, I don’t have that broken down by shift type. We’d need to gather that information.
Dr WOODRUFF – Okay. Can I put that as a question on notice?
Mr ROCKLIFF – Is that information accessible?
Dr WOODRUFF – It is, I’ve seen the roster before. It is collected.
Mrs MORGAN-WICKS – Yes, we do have rosters. We have thousands of rosters across the Ambulance Service, so we’d need to determine whether we have that collected in an integrated form. We’re unsure whether we have that information without a significant manual roster by roster collation of the data.
Dr WOODRUFF – Thank you. I’m not sure how much work it is but I think it is incredibly important for Tasmanians to understand how many rosters are not filled by paramedics across the state. I get regular reports, particularly in regional areas, that they’re not filled. We need to understand the extent of that and whether these reports are true or not.
Mrs MORGAN-WICKS – That is probably, again, one of the very valuable reasons why we are replacing our legacy and ageing HR digital infrastructure with our brand new HRIS system. I’ve had feedback from staff members right across the system, from paramedics to doctors to nurses to allied health professionals into our kitchens, et cetera, in terms of their desire to see the new rostering module of HRIS implemented. The team is working very hard to get that information into the system. In addition to assistance and saving of time with rostering, the saving of time for our payroll teams in having to manually enter that information currently, we will also have a better monitoring suite for the data that is uploaded into these modules in HRIS.
Dr WOODRUFF – Thanks. I am also very excited about the future but we’re just talking about what’s happened in the last financial year.
Could I put on notice for that information to be provided? I know it is available because we have seen rosters. The roster master sheets do have that information available to them.
Mr ROCKLIFF – I think we’re working on some information at this present time, Mr Webster, as a result of the question in the Legislative Council. Is that correct?
Mr WEBSTER – Yes. We are working on the data by location but not by day versus night shifts. We’re putting that together at the moment
Dr WOODRUFF – You could provide me that information on notice for the last financial year by region?
Mr WEBSTER – By region, minister?
Dr WOODRUFF – By region, by ambulance station, yes.
Ms DOW – Do you get regular updates on that, Premier, about the vacant shifts across the state?
Dr WOODRUFF – I know that there are night shifts regularly not filled in some of these stations. We need to know that. People need to know that. We need to know the extent of under-resourcing. It’s not Mr Emery’s fault, it’s just where you are, so we would like to see that, please.
Mr ROCKLIFF – We will work to provide that information if possible.
Dr WOODRUFF – I will put it in writing. My second question is about annual leave. We understand the paramedics in the south of the state and it might also be in the north and the north west have been frustrated by their inability to get leave granted from Ambulance Tasmania for the coming year. It seems quite a lot of staff will be banking significant amounts of leave as their requests to take it have been denied. Can you please tell me why that is happening? It is concerning, given that paramedics are under so much pressure in very intensive and traumatic work conditions.
We think it is important for people to have their annual leave entitlements taken when they need it. Can you explain why it is not happening and why you don’t think it would contribute to extra burnout?
Mr ROCKLIFF – Recreation leave taken as at the 31 March 2023 was 7.42 per cent of paid FTE, which was also higher than last year’s percentage of pay leave at 6.54 per cent of paid FTE. What other information do we have?
I have recreation leave by award as percentage of paid FTE. Would you like those figures?
Dr WOODRUFF – What does that mean? I am asking about the year ahead. People are asking for leave and they are not being granted. It is about people who are not getting access to the leave that they want. We understand that is the case in the south.
Mr WEBSTER – Through you, minister. The level of staff taking leave or the percentage of people on leave over the year is relevant. In 2021-22, 9.63 per cent was involved in recreation leave. So far this financial year it is 11.21 per cent, which indicates an increase in the taking of recreation leave. There is a process with rostered staff of needing to nominate and it be built into rosters. The statistics are showing an increase in the granting of recreational leave, not a decrease.
Dr WOODRUFF – For the coming year, just to be really clear, through you, minister, Mr Webster, are there any staff who have been directed that they will not be given recreation leave for 2023-24?
Mr WEBSTER – I am not going to say there are no staff that have had that. As I just explained it’s part of rostering so they may have asked for a period of leave that doesn’t fit with the rostering for that particular period.
Dr WOODRUFF – For the whole year. I am talking about across a year where people are wanting to take their leave entitlement. I accept that they cannot get it at Easter or at Christmas. This is not what we are hearing. We are hearing it is like we will not be able to grant leave this year.
Mr WEBSTER – Through you, minister, I will pass to Mr Emery for that level of detail.
Mr EMERY – Through you, minister, and thanks Dr Woodruff. We do have processes for how paramedics and all employees apply for leave. On occasion we will see higher applications for leave during school holiday periods and over the Christmas period. We will, periodically, have to decline some applications for leave to ensure that we can continue to maintain operational rosters over that period time.
There wouldn’t be an occasion where an employee would be told ‘under no circumstances can you take any leave this year’. It may require a process wherein which their local leader and the paramedic negotiates on days that might work, to ensure that we don’t have roster holes and no paramedic coverage because too many people are on leave at any period of time.
Dr WOODRUFF – Thank you. You are confident that that isn’t the case. People haven’t been told ‘You can’t take leave this year’.
Mr EMERY – I’d be very confident, Dr Woodruff, that no paramedic was told ‘you’re not entitled to take any leave this year’. It would be a negotiation with the employee about what leave blocks are available, so that we can carefully spread our resources and ensure we can provide emergency coverage.
Dr WOODRUFF – Thanks. I wanted it to be on the record that there is widespread frustration amongst paramedics – at least in the south of the state – that it’s extremely difficult to get leave because of the lack of paramedics. That is really having an effect for some people on their capacity to manage the trauma and stress of their work.
In relation to the MYPOL support system, which was something that we’ve talked about previously to manage trauma and psychological distress, can you tell us if there’s been any change, Premier, to the number of paramedics who are tapping into the MYPOL support system?
Is there any other support that is available to them?
Mr ROCKLIFF – Thanks very much, Dr Woodruff. Mr Emery?
Mr EMERY – I don’t have the immediate number available for you, Dr Woodruff. In some cases, the engagement with MYPOL is confidential and independent of the employer. We continue to have a range of services available, including through the Wellbeing Unit that we share services through, alongside our colleagues in the Department of Police, Fire and Emergency Management. That includes access to specialist psychologists including a panel of psychologists that can provide that support to paramedics.
We have our critical incident stress management program or CISM, as you may have heard it referred to, which provides immediate care in the aftermath of a critical incident.
There are wellbeing program officers across the state who work within the wellbeing unit and can provide a range of referrals to a vast array of psychosocial support services, and we have four employee assistance program providers in the state that paramedics can tap into 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
The final program I’ll touch on, Dr Woodruff, is we have a dedicated internal peer support officer program with 26 specially trained, peer support officers across the state. They can provide peer to peer support for paramedics, volunteers and, indeed, leaders and corporate staff as well experiencing mental health challenges.
Mr ROCKLIFF – Further to your Budget-related question, I’m advised there is $1.5 million per annum in additional funding to boost health and wellbeing support for all emergency service personnel and volunteers, and all Ambulance Tasmania employees and volunteers can access Department of Police, Fire and Emergency Management wellbeing support officers.
The Department of Police, Fire and Emergency Management also provides access to and administers online physical and mental health assessments through the MYPOL. Following completion of the assessments, coaching assistance provided by Allied Health professionals and other more immediate interventions are in place for individuals, as required. In 2021, as we’ve discussed before, I believe, AT engaged a third party organisation – Frontline Mind – to conduct two
