Episodes of care
Organisations providing Indigenous primary health services report on both their client contacts and episodes of care in the OSR. An episode of care is a contact between a client and 1 or more health workers in an organisation in 1 calendar day. All contacts with the same client on the same day are counted as 1 episode of care only, but if more than 1 health worker sees that client in the same day (for example, both a nurse and doctor see the same client) then 1 episode of care will count as multiple client contacts. An episode of care may be provided by employed or visiting health staff, either on site or off site. Episodes of care do not include administrative contacts or those relating to groups and residential care.
In 2017–18, organisations providing Indigenous primary health services made around 3.6 million episodes of care—an average of 7.5 episodes of care per client. Of these:
- 3.1 million (87%) were with Indigenous clients
- 2.1 million (58%) were with female clients and 1.5 million (41%) with male clients
- 800,000 were provided in both Very remote areas (23%) and in Outer regional areas (23%)
- 1 million (28%) were provided in Queensland, followed by around 800,000 in both the Northern Territory (23%) and in New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory combined (22%)
- nearly 3.1 million were provided by ACCHSs (85%) and around half a million (15%) by other organisations.
The following data visualisation provides more information on the episodes of care provided by these organisations.