Immunisation
Last updated March 15, 2023
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Immunisation of the population is key to ensuring that vaccine preventable diseases are effectively controlled. General Practices have a key role in the national vaccine strategy. This work is supported by the PHN through a range of activities.
Increasing Immunisation coverage is a national priority and the PHN works with primary health care providers and stakeholders to maintain and increase our region’s coverage rate.
The PHN supports General Practices by providing appropriate and timely information to Immunisation providers. Resources to assist optimising Immunisation rates and improving patient health outcomes can be found here.
For Immunisation support please contact your Primary Care Improvement Officer (PCIO). Submit questions and download resources through our immunisation community of practice: Immunisation Community of Practice | HNECC PHN peoplebank
Data and Dashboard
Data Extraction
CAT4 Recipes
PenCS has several recipes you can use to focus on the Immunisation status of your patients in order to improve upon your immunisation rates. To identify the patients within your practice who are eligible for an Immunisation, please search ‘Immunisation‘ on the PenCS website.
The PHN provides free licencing to the PenCS suite of products (It combines platforms of the Clinical Audit Tool (CAT4), PAT CAT and Topbar) for the extraction of data from general practices to support with:
- Quality Improvement
- Accreditation standards
- Practice Incentive Program (PIP) Quality Improvement (QI)
- Population Health planning/support (Comprehensive General Dashboard Reports).
It is compatible with most of the General Practice Clinical Information Systems (CIS). All identifiable data extracted from a Clinical Information System using CAT Plus is securely stored within the practice and not moved offsite.
For more information on the PenCS suite of tools please visit https://www.pencs.com.au/ and for more information and support with General Practice Data please contact your PCIO.
Quality Improvement
Record Templates
Practical Examples
Fundamentals Guide
Improvement Toolkit
The Patient
Community of Practice
Join the Immunisation Community of Practice
This PHN’s Communities of Practice (CoP) are open to primary care providers within the Hunter, New England & Central Coast Primary Health Network region to share ideas and resources to support quality improvement activities.
Anyone associated with a primary care organisation in the Hunter, New England and Central Coast regions is welcome to request membership of the CoP.
Evidence of employment in a primary care organisation or evidence of working closely with primary care clinicians will be required.
Please note that any resources contributed to this site can be viewed by members of that CoP and by sharing them you agree that others can use and adapt them freely.
To join the Community of practice for Immunisation, please email Kaycee Wisemantel at kwisemantel@thephn.com.au.
Resources
The PHN recorded education library
Hunter New England HealthPathways
Hunter New England PatientInfo
Royal Australian College of General Practitioners
Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association
Services Australia and Australian Immunisation Register (AIR)
Inlcudes:
- How to record vaccinations on the Australian Immunisation Register (AIR)
- How to set up access to the Australian Immunisation Register (AIR)
- Medicare billing for Immunisations.
The AIR is a national register that records vaccinations given to people of all ages in Australia. It is now mandatory for ALL vaccine encounters to be uploaded to the AIR Australian Immunisation Register Amendment (Reporting) Bill 2020, so it is important that you regularly perform clinical software updates and check to ensure that encounters are successfully being uploaded.
Australian Government Department of Health
Includes:
- The Australian Immunisation Handbook
- National vaccine storage guidelines: Strive for 5 (3rd edition).
Includes:
- Immunisation programs
- Vaccine storage and cold chain management
- NSW Immunisation Schedule.
PENCS - Includes:
- Immunisations.