ACIITC update
Continuing the new regular column in Technology Review, the Aged Care Industry IT Company updates on its activities including its now regular consultation with DSS and new initiatives in the works.
Continuing the new regular column in September’s Technology Review magazine, the Aged Care Industry IT Company updates on our activities including out now regular consultation with DSS and new initiatives in the works, write Graeme Prior, Anne Livingstone and Gavin Tomlins.
The major concentration of resources of the Aged Care Industry IT Company (ACIitC) during recent months has been to focus on the technical and business transformation issues related to the reform and introduction of new structures under the My Aged Care, Gateway and Regional Assessment Service structures.
The ACIitC National Home Care Committee and the CIO Forum continue to convene and facilitate the ACIitC Department of Social Services (DSS) Gateway User Testing Group. Members of this group have met in Canberra on three occasions to date for face-to-face meetings and testing of the technical infrastructure being introduced.
Several opportunities have been taken outside these meetings to proactively take up the industry concerns as well as provide solutions to the department for consideration.
The ACIitC would like to formally thank the 23 organisations nationally who have participated in this group and for generously giving staff time to influence improvements in the systems being rolled out.
ACIitC has also formalised a regular forum with key DSS staff and this group has met regularly during the past three months. This forum is co-chaired by Graeme Prior as the independent Chair of ACIitC and Fiona Buffinton, group manager of the Access, Quality and Compliance Group at DSS.
This important forum is a venue to raise business transformation issues for the industry in relation to reforms being implemented by the department. It also provides a vehicle to alert the government of strategic needs of the industry in respect to innovation and technology.
At the time this article goes to print, ACIitC is working with the department to bring together an opportunity for broader industry consultation on the business-to-government requirements post the 1 July 2015 reforms.
In our next column in Technology Review we will be giving an update on this activity.
Survey news
Through the ACIitC National Home Care Committee, a sub-group has continued to develop and issue industry surveys. These surveys have been designed to provide evidence and statistics of the industry to inform the work of the ACIitC as well as to provide material to present to government during our discussions.
Our most recent survey has been targeted at gaining a view of the first period of operation of the Regional Assessment Service. A further general industry survey will be released shortly to capture sector views on the recent reforms. The ACIitC has been approached by several universities to collaborate on research and we will be reporting on this in our next article.
Our new initiatives
In a bid to revitalise our work and make the ACIitC more accessible to the members it serves, a scope of works has begun to transform the operations, communication platform and engagement model of the ACIitC.
Work has started on a number of these initiatives including the construction of centralised forums providing a place for discussion on a range of issues facing the industry and daily operations. It is intended to go beyond technical issues but also serve to assist in business process improvement and collaborative opportunities.
Following on from the successful ACIitC coordinated Gateway User Testing group engagements with DSS, it was identified that a centralised register of issues covering items in relation to government agencies and vendors would be of benefit.
A number of organisations have already volunteered to input their documented issues around the MyAgedCare Gateway and the Regional Assessment Service introduction.
The intent of this activity is to share the lessons and experiences of others and support improvements and efficiencies for the greater good of the industry as a whole. These issues are being collated for a unified presentation back to government agencies to ensure a unified voice on matters affecting organisations during the reform and change of systems period.
A centralised document repository has also put in place to cover the works of the ACIitC. It is the intent to make this visible to all members as soon as possible. The repository will hold information gathered from various sources including ITAC and it is planned to showcase and share initiatives and excellence in technology implementations in the sector.
The document repository already has a number of contributions from members of the various committees of the ACIitC, which cover diverse resources including a number of example document templates, contracts and checklists for organisations to copy and use under a Creative Commons license. We look forward to releasing this initiate shortly.
Raising our profile
The members of the ACIitC have also been looking at ways to raise the profile of its work and present greater network opportunities. The company is in the process of launching a number of social initiatives including its LinkedIn company profile, Google+ and Facebook page enabling the presentation of other channels of communication.
Examining the analytics of the social media stream, the council found that there are over 4,000 professionals engaged in the social media platforms currently within Australia across 100-plus initiatives whether it be groups or projects.
The company? is hoping that the social media streams complement its website by showing the projects and services that the council is currently involved in to a wider audience that already has the social media conduits as part of their daily digest diet.
Coming up
We remind all Technology Review readers that the Information Technology in Aged Care conference (ITAC) is just around the corner on November 24 and 25 at the Gold Coast. ITAC 2015 ‘Living the Age Revolution: IT driving change’ is bringing together a diverse range of international and national speakers. The line-up of presentations is not to be missed.
ACIitC plans to hold a series of activities in conjunction with ITAC and details of these will be circulated shortly. A focus of this will be the opportunity to review our ICT Vision for Aged Care. Details on our work in this area is accessible from aciitc.com.au/it-vision and see itacconference.com.au for more on ITAC.
If you are interested in providing feedback on the work of the ACIitC or becoming involved in our activities please email info@aciitc.com.au or go to aciitc.com.au.
Graeme Prior is independent chair of the Aged Care Industry IT Company Ltd, Anne Livingstone is chair of the National Home Care Committee and Gavin Tomlins is chair of the CIO Forum.
See the September edition of Technology Review magazine for more aged care technology news, opinion and special features.
