Busy primary healthcare professionals will now have access to free, peer-reviewed, accredited online education packages at their fingertips, enabling them to upskill on essential respiratory topics of breathlessness, COPD and asthma.
The project, funded by the Australian Government, is delivered by the Lung Learning Partnership of the Lung Foundation Australia, The Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand (TSANZ), and Asthma Australia.
Lung Foundation Australia CEO Mark Brooke said the new Quality use of Medicines in Chronic Airways Disease (QUAD) healthcare professional education program would be available through respiratory education and training platform, the Lung Learning Hub.
“QUAD’s education packages will be a game changer for primary care practitioners, giving quick access to the latest information based on best practice and evidence-based guidelines,” Mr Brooke said.
“Ensuring Australian healthcare providers can optimise their skills, means better patient outcomes through the highest level of respiratory care.”
Asthma Australia Director of Health Knowledge and Translation, Anthony Flynn said the program and three education packages were informed by a consultative design process with both healthcare professionals and people with lived experience, to deliver useful and relevant content meeting the contemporary needs of healthcare professionals as they support people with chronic airways disease (CAD).
“The QUAD education packages are an important step forward in empowering healthcare professionals with the knowledge and tools they need to manage asthma and other chronic airways diseases more effectively,” Mr Flynn said.
“By providing this education, we are working to bridge the gap between what we know people with lived experience of chronic airways diseases need and what many of them get, by supporting healthcare professionals deliver best-practice, person-centred care.”
TSANZ CEO Vincent So, said a panel of TSANZ members who are experts in the field of respiratory medicine and science have conducted the peer review process.
The first QUAD education package, which can be accessed now, comprehensively covers breathlessness, and has been approved by Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) for three hours of Continuing professional development (CPD), helping primary healthcare professionals to:
- Identify breathlessness as an important presenting symptom for chronic airways disease and other conditions.
- Determine where ongoing breathlessness is a symptom of chronic airways disease despite optimisation.
- Implement clinically appropriate diagnostic and referral pathways, e.g. blood tests lung function testing, imaging, and cardiac investigations, in their clinical practice.
- Use breathlessness management strategies
Mr Brooke said the asthma and COPD education initiatives will be launched in late 2024, with pre-registration now open.
The QUAD education modules are part of the Lung Learning Hub, available at www.lunglearninghub.com.au/the-quad.
-ENDS-
For media enquiries please contact:
Deirdre McGinn, Sabio on behalf of Lung Foundation Australia
0411 208 408
Deirdre@sabio.com.au
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