The document discusses building a healthy workforce committed to prevention through multi-sectoral partnerships. It describes the shift needed from clinical medicine to public health, including changing from focusing on individual patients to whole populations. It also outlines the core competencies and skills needed for modern health workers, including basic medical knowledge as well as skills in areas like innovation, business, advocacy and epidemiology. Finally, it discusses how recent Australian health reforms present opportunities to strengthen investments in prevention through initiatives like the National Partnership Agreement on Preventive Health and Medicare Locals.

1. 2nd ILSI-CHIP Symposium Dec 7-8th 2011
Community Health and Wellbeing
Through Multi-Sectoral Partnerships
Health Reform
Prevention is Everyone’s Business
Plenary 4: Building a Healthy Workforce
Committed to Prevention
What are the Core Competencies for
Prevention in a Health Workforce?
Professor Glen F. Maberly, Director, CHIP

2. Hippocrates
A physician is skilled in treating and
certainly not harming their patients – a
master physician is skilled in treating
whole populations – translated annotation

3. Moving from Clinical Medicine to Public
Health Practitioner
Patient becomes Population
Family & social history becomes Cultural, Socio-
economic and Political environment
Medical History/Assessment becomes Epidemiology
profile & activities of potential partners
Diagnosis/Problem List becomes Burden of Disease
Management becomes– Multi-sector interventions
Follow-up - Evaluation

4. Components of Community Health and
Wellbeing Programs
BEHAVIOURAL CHANGE
Advocacy/ Politics
Communication/ Media
Education/Marketing
MANAGEMENT
Human Resources
Training/Skills
Information MULTI SECTOR INTERVENTION
Networks Councils/Planning/Design/
ASSESSMENT
Financial Resources Services
Baseline and follow-up Survey
Other Resources Food production & Supply
Situation Assessment
Inspection and Enforcement Schools/Education
Program Monitoring Government Institutions
Evaluation Recreation/Sports
Transport
Social Services

5. Skills for Modern Health Worker
Basic skills set Enhanced skill set
 Strong/ up-to-date medical  Innovation and
knowledge and experience entrepreneurial
 Specialised procedural,  Finance and business
diagnostic and other  Partnering
technical  Advocacy, education &
 Strong communication skills marketing
with patients, carers, staff,  Epidemiology,
colleagues monitoring & evaluation
 eHealth savvy
if you don’t have it rent it

6. Commonwealth / State Health Reform
COAG has agreed to work in partnership on National Health Reform with the following
initiatives that have opportunity to strengthen investments in prevention.
National Partnership Agreement on Preventive Health
The Australian National Preventive Health Agency is committed to conducting a national audit of our current
workforce and developing a new strategy to strengthen it.
The NSW Government committed to strengthening preventative health initiatives
Minister’s Presentation
Local Hospital Network
To have a prevention role
Medicare Local
To have a population focus and a prevention role
National Aged Care System, including Home and Community Care (HACC)
New initiatives for District Programs for Aged Care and Healthcare to support healthy aging (Dec 23)
Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record (PCEHR)
Information systems to support coordinated care and health coaching
Workforce Development
 Training more GPs and medical specialists, and better supporting nurses and allied health professionals
Let’s harness these reforms to also build the prevention workforce
For more Info: http://www.yourhealth.gov.au

7. Public-Private-Civic Partnership
Prevention is everyone‘s business
Sharing Culture – bring your partnership
skills to the table
Share the Vision - everyone can see and
share the big picture
Satisfy Needs – “what’s in it for me”
recognised for each partner
Specialise Contribution – each party brings
recognised unique value
Streamline – change what you do a little to
benefit the whole
Shared Risk and Reward - there is enough
sunshine for everyone
Stay optimistic – many reasons to say no,
stay focused on the “why not”