The Summit on Clinical Governance in Digital Health was an in-person and virtual event that took place in Sydney on 7 February 2023, and was a collaboration with the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care.
If you weren’t able to be part of the over 900-strong audience who joined the conversation either virtually or in-person on the day, you can still watch the plenary addresses, keynote speeches and panel sessions below.
Thanks to the incredible digital health community, our partners, delegates, changemakers and emerging leaders for making this Summit a huge success.
Why C3.0?
The summit was inspired by Web 3.0, which represents the next evolution of the internet built on the foundations of decentralisation, openness and greater usability, and explored the next iteration of clinical governance in digital heath. Its purpose: to facilitate a better understanding of our shared responsibility of safety, quality and the continuous improvement in the delivery of health technologies through the key themes of Connect. Care. Confidence.
Welcome to Country
Brendan Kerin
Metropolitan Local Aboriginal Land Council
Opening remarks
The Hon Mark Butler MP
Minister for Health and Aged Care
Setting the scene
Amanda Cattermole PSM
CEO Australian Digital Health Agency
Chris Leahy
Acting CEO Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care
Amanda Cattermole PSM and Chris Leahy opened the day by exploring the increasing focus on clinical governance for frontline organisations as they engage in digital health readiness, changes and adoption.
They discussed how clinical governance is relevant for digital health more broadly - for those organisations that support health outcomes through education, guidance and digital health solutions - to ensure that collectively all parts of the health ecosystem support positive health and care across Australia.
The last of us: Lessons in clinical governance for a post-pandemic world where digital health is health
Dr Louise Schaper
CEO Australasian Institute of Digital Health
In this thought-provoking address, Louise asked the question, if clinical governance is so important and so aligned to the core of health and care, why do we get it wrong? Is “better connected health and care” enough? The challenge was posed for all of us to recognise our role in clinical governance and to understand how we translate knowing better to doing better.
Panel 1a – Delivering connected health and care
Facilitator
Dr Robert Herkes MBBS FRACP FCICM
Chief Medical Officer, Ramsay Health Care Australia
Speakers
Dr Nathan Pinskier
Former Melbourne General Practitioner and Board Member Peninsula Health
Brigadier Isaac Seidl
Director-General Operational Health, Department of Defence
Dr Helen Almond RN RSCN MSc
Senior Lecturer, Health Service Management (Safety and Quality), Australian Institute of Health Service Management, College of Business and Economics (COBE), University of Tasmania
Professor Peter Sprivulis
Chief Clinical Information Officer, Department of Health WA, Emergency Physician, WACHS Emergency Telehealth Service
Panellists gave a unique overview of their journey in delivering health and care. They discussed their individual experiences of clinical governance and digital health solutions, challenges and opportunities they faced in achieving connected health and care.
Panel 1b – Supporting connected health and care
Facilitator
Dr Steve Hambleton AM
Chief Clinical Advisor, Australian Digital Health Agency
Speakers
Danielle Bancroft
Pharmacist; Chief Product Officer, Best Practice Software; Human Centred Designer and Product Innovator
Professor Farah Magrabi
Professor of Biomedical & Health Informatics, Macquarie University
Dr Monica Trujillo MBBS, MPH, FRACMA, FAIDH
Chief Health Officer, Telstra Health; Non‑Executive Director, Australasian Institute of Digital Health; Neville Board Chief Digital Health Officer, Department of Health, Victoria
Neville Board
Chief Digital Health Officer, Department of Health, Victoria
Panellists shared their perspective on how clinical governance principles helped their businesses to promote digital health solutions that are patient-centred and clinically safe.
Panel 2a – Digitally enabled continuity of care
Facilitator
Dr Danielle McMullen
Vice President of the Australian Medical Association and a General Practitioner
Speakers
Professor Erwin Loh MBBS, LLB(Hons), MHSM, MBA, PhD, FRACMA
Chief Medical Officer and Group General Manager Clinical Governance, St Vincent’s Health Australia; Adjunct Clinical Professor, School of Clinical Sciences at Monash Health, Monash University
Dr Bernadette Eather
Chief Nurse and Clinical Services Director at Ramsey Health Care Australia
Dr Jason King
Director of Clinical Services, Gurriny Yealamucka Health Service Cairns, Queensland; Yued Noongar Primary Care Physician
Darlene Cox
Executive Director of Health Care Consumers Association; Board Member, Meridian; Board Member, Capital Health Network
Panellists shared their views on the challenges and opportunities in achieving greater electronic exchange of health information to support person-centred service delivery across the continuum of care.
Panel 2b – Supporting health and care through digital evolution
Facilitator
Professor Enrico Coiera MB BS Syd, PhD UNSW, FACMI, FACHI
Director, Centre for Health Informatics, Australian Institute of Health Innovation, Macquarie University
Speakers
Professor George Margelis MBBS M.Optom GCEBus
Independent Chair at Aged Care Industry Information Technology Council; Adjunct Associate Professor, TeleHealth Research & Innovation Laboratory University of Western Sydney
Dr Peter Kennedy PSM
Chief Clinical Information Officer, eHealth NSW
Dr Louise Schaper
CEO Australasian Institute of Digital Health
Panellists shared their insights into how digital evolution, supported by clinical governance, will improve health and care now and into the future.
Panel 3a – Building confidence by managing medico-legal risk
Dr Melanie Tan
Clinical Governance and Medico-legal Consultant. Medical practitioner. Lawyer (health/medico-legal/aged care).
Dr Melanie Tan explored how we might manage medico-legal risk in digital health while supporting person-centred care, which is at the core of contemporary clinical governance. There is an ostensible tension between medico-legal risk and clinical governance.
For example, person-centred care in clinical governance means we work towards ensuring people engage with their health information to support the concept of dignity of risk. However, this creates a medico-legal risk, in that health information may be inadequate or incomplete which is contrary to traditional principles of good record keeping. As the future is digital health technologies, what opportunities exist to manage medico-legal risk.
Panel 3b – Building confidence in the virtual care environment
Dr Teresa Anderson AM
Chief Executive, Sydney Local Health District
Digital health solutions are transforming and allowing new models to be explored, such as telehealth, virtual care and remote monitoring. Dr Teresa Anderson discussed Australia’s first virtual hospital (RPA virtual) and how clinical governance is building confidence, supporting and continuing improving their healthcare delivery.
Shaping the future of digital health solutions through health and care governance
Amanda Cattermole PSM
CEO, Australian Digital Health Agency
Dr Steve Hambleton AM
Chief Clinical Advisor, Australian Digital Health Agency
Australian Digital Health Agency’s CEO Amanda Cattermole PSM and Chief Clinical Advisor Dr Hambleton AM explored the Agency’s clinical governance journey and shared the Agency’s vision for the future of connected health and care across Australia.
International perspective: The role of clinical governance in advancing digital health transformation in global health systems
Dr Anne Snowdon RN, PhD, FAAN
Professor, Strategy and Entrepreneurship Scientific Director and CEO SCAN Health
Dr Anne Snowdon, joined us virtually from Canada to examined the current challenges that global health systems experience in the post pandemic era of COVID-19. Anne explored international perspectives on the growth in demands for care, the challenge of workforce sustainability, shifts in consumer expectations, and the uncertainty and disruption in global supply chain was profiled and examined relative to digital health strategy.
