University of Tasmania, Australia

Health policy: making a difference to chronic disease services in rural communities

An elite scholarship is available in the area of health policy, targeting health services for chronic disease prevention and treatment in rural communities. The successful applicant will develop methods for measuring and improving how well health services meet the needs of those with chronic disease. A social inclusion approach will be taken that targets groups with unequal health outcomes in rural Australia who are experiencing particular disadvantages such as social exclusion through socio-economic disadvantage. The project will involve a strong policy development focus and step-wise consultation with state and national, as well as international, policy-makers and health agencies. The successful applicant will review existing methods for benchmarking health services in the area of chronic disease, including benchmarking data from such bodies as the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Australian Institute for Health and Welfare; consult with policy-makers and community stakeholders about appropriate indicators and approaches; develop methods and a model for better assessing service performance for disadvantaged and socially excluded groups. Applicants with a background in quantitative methods are particularly encouraged to apply. The successful applicant will be supervised by Associate Professor Erica Bell, Deputy Director at the University Department of Rural Health (UDRH), and work within the UDRH’s health policy research program at the Hobart office of the UDRH. As a key outcome being sought for this thesis is a benchmarking method that is useful to Australian policy-makers, the successful candidate will be required to work with a community stake-holder group predominantly comprised of state and national health policy-makers.