Use of a quality improvement strategy to increase drug and alcohol consultation and care opportunities for mental health inpatients in rural and remote New South Wales.

Problem: Mental health inpatients have high rates of co-morbid substance use disorders which may exceed 50% in addition to the presenting complaint(s). Treating teams may prioritise, and substance use disorders are often not addressed.

Setting: Dubbo inpatient mental health units.

BD ProbeTec ET assay for the diagnosis of gonorrhoea in a high-risk population: a protocol for replacing traditional microscopy and culture techniques.

Objectives: To evaluate the Neisseria gonorrhoeae Becton Dickinson (BD) ProbeTec strand displacement assay (SDA) on female endocervical swab and male first void urine against culture for Neisseria gonorrhoeae on female endocervical and urethral swab for the diagnosis of N gonorrhoeae infection in genitourinary medicine (GUM) attendees. To determine an algorithm for implementation of N gonorrhoeae infection screening by SDA in these patients taking account of the desirability of having a N gonorrhoeae isolate in people with N gonorrhoeae infection.

Methods: Initially, 1582 patients attending the GUM clinic were tested for N gonorrhoeae infection by SDA and routine microscopy, and culture.