South Australia joins Paediatric Improvement Collaborative
Wednesday, February 21 2024
South Australia has recently joined the Paediatric Improvement Collaborative (PIC), in partnership with Clinical Excellence Queensland, the New South Wales Agency for Clinical Innovation, Safer Care Victoria, and the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne, to further enhance the quality of Paediatric Clinical Practice Guidelines (CPGs) in Australia. As a result of this collaboration, there are now over 150 paediatric CPGs officially endorsed for use in SA.
The CPGs are point of care guidelines, developed to assist clinicians with decisions about appropriate health care for children and young people and to promote consistency of paediatric clinical practice. They are designed to provide concise practical advice regarding assessment and management of common and serious paediatric conditions and are developed by a multidisciplinary team of practising clinicians, based on the available evidence and consensus.
Established in July 2018, the Paediatric Improvement Collaborative (PIC) whose key objective is to reduce unwarranted variation in paediatric clinical care, is a multi-site clinical network that allow practice-based teams to learn from one another, test changes to improve quality, and use their collective experience and data to understand, implement and spread what works in practice. Central to achieving this objective is the development, endorsement, publication, and promotion of evidence-based CPGs that outline best practice clinical management of high volume and high-risk paediatric clinical conditions.
The initial aim of the PIC was to adapt a number of Victorian paediatric CPGs to be appropriate for use in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria, however, PIC Steering Committee discussions have included the aim to move this to a national project.
Each of the States involved, has appointed representatives to assist with the application of local and state-based knowledge to the national CPGs during the development and review process, ensuring relevance for all CPG users. Representatives include clinicians from General Paediatrics, Emergency medicine and General practice, including medical staff (consultants and trainees), nursing staff and allied health staff.
The South Australian Child and Adolescent Health Community of Practice (SA CAHCoP) is entrusted with the responsibility of delivering clinical leadership and oversight of paediatric clinical practice in SA Health and has selected six (6) paediatric clinical representatives from across metropolitan and rural Local Health Networks through an expression of interest.
Thanks to this collaboration, clinicians working with children and young people now have access to over 200 CPGs endorsed for use in South Australia. The national (PIC) identified guidelines are hosted by the Royal Children’s Hospital and can be accessed via:
- Royal Children’s Hospital CPG index
- Royal Children’s Hospital App (available for Apple and Android)
South Australia’s Paediatric Clinical Practice Guidelines can be accessed via:
- SA Health Website
- SA Health web-based App (available for Apple and Android)
To learn more about the PIC, or to hear from paediatricians on why it’s important to use clinical practice guidelines that are specific for children, visit Clinical Practice Guidelines: Paediatric Improvement Collaborative (rch.org.au).
For all other enquiries please email Health.PaediatricClinicalGuidelines@sa.gov.au.