The Medical Commander project at the Gold Coast University Hospital (GCUH) creates a role for a senior coordination clinician, who acts as a centre point in a multidisciplinary approach to optimise patient flow from the pre-hospital space to the inpatient wards or discharge to the community. The role requires a balanced approach to managing competing priorities encompassing Queensland Ambulance Service (QAS) asset allocation and resourcing, emergency department patient flow dynamics and clinical service delivery, as well as inpatient admission access pathways and avoidance strategies. The Medical Commander uses his or her high level of interdisciplinary skills in communication, complex decision and clinical experience to perform this role.
Medical Commander for stretched Infectious Diseases teams
Initiative Type
Service Improvement
Status
Sustained
Added
10 October 2022
Last updated
07 December 2022
Summary
Key dates
Mar 2020
Oct 2022
Implementation sites
Gold Coast University Hospital
Partnerships
Healthcare Improvement Unit (HIU)
Aim
To alleviate the pressures in Queensland's emergency departments.
Benefits
- offloading of distracting jobs from consultants involved in direct patient care
- source of up-to-date COVID information for ED and wider hospital (offloading stretched Infectious Diseases teams)
- provides a central point of contact for pre-hospital and intra-hospital communications with ED
- provides a dedicated clinician to manage efficient ambulance offload
- provides a dedicated clinician to attend to early Mental Health assessment and medical clearance
- provides a dedicated clinician to liaise with executive team during periods of severe service pressure
- ensures the availability of an extra senior clinician during simultaneous resus situations
Background
The combined challenges of early phase COVID-19 response, COVID-19 surge periods, increased mental health presentations and escalating acuity and patient demand on emergency department resources, prompted consideration of a dedicated clinician to act as a source of up-to-date COVID information, provide early mental health patient review and to have general oversight over the emergency department as a whole, including patient flow and staffing.
