A cost effectiveness study of integrated care in health services delivery: a diabetes program in Australia.

Background: Type 2 diabetes is rapidly growing as a proportion of the disease burden in Australia as elsewhere. This study addresses the cost effectiveness of an integrated approach to assisting general practitioners (GPs) with diabetes management. This approach uses a centralized database of clinical data of an Australian Division of General Practice (a network of GPs) to co-ordinate care according to national guidelines.

Emergent themes in the sustainability of primary health care innovation.

A synthesis of the findings of the five studies of sustainability of primary health care innovation across six domains (political, institutional, financial, economic, client and workforce) yielded three main themes. These were: the importance of social relationships, networks and champions; the effect of political, financial and societal forces; and the motivation and capacity of agents within the system. The need for routine assessment of the sustainability of primary health care innovations is discussed.

The demise of a planned randomised controlled trial in an urban Aboriginal medical service.

To fill a gap in knowledge about the effectiveness of brief intervention for hazardous alcohol use among Indigenous Australians, we attempted to implement a randomised controlled trial in an urban Aboriginal Medical Service (AMS) as a joint AMS-university partnership. Because of low numbers of potential participants being screened, the RCT was abandoned in favour of a two-part "demonstration project". Only 16 clients were recruited for follow-up in six-months, and the trial was terminated.