Medical students, early general practice placements and positive supervisor experiences.

Introduction Community-based longitudinal clinical placements for medical students are becoming more common globally. The perspective of supervising clinicians about their experiences and processes involved in maximising these training experiences has received less attention than that of students. Aims This paper explores the general practitioner (GP) supervisor perspective of positive training experiences with medical students undertaking urban community-based, longitudinal clinical placements in the early years of medical training.

A Delphi study assessing the utility of quality improvement tools and resources in Australian primary care.

Objectives: To determine the relevance and utility of online tools and resources to support organisational performance development in primary care and to complement the Primary Care Practice Improvement Tool (PC-PIT).

Design: A purposively recruited Expert Advisory Panel of 12 end users used a modified Delphi technique to evaluate 53 tools and resources identified through a previously conducted systematic review. The panel comprised six practice managers and six general practitioners who had participated in the PC-PIT pilot study in 2013-2014.

Quality tools and resources to support organisational improvement integral to high-quality primary care: a systematic review of published and grey literature.

Objective: To conduct a systematic review of the literature to identify existing online primary care quality improvement tools and resources to support organisational improvement related to the seven elements in the Primary Care Practice Improvement Tool (PC-PIT), with the identified tools and resources to progress to a Delphi study for further assessment of relevance and utility.

Study Design: Systematic review of the international published and grey literature.

Data Sources: CINAHL, Embase and PubMed databases were searched in March 2014 for articles published between January 2004 and December 2013.

Trial of the Primary Care Practice Improvement Tool: building organisational performance in Australian general practice and primary health care.

Objective: To nationally trial the Primary Care Practice Improvement Tool (PC-PIT), an organisational performance improvement tool previously co-created with Australian primary care practices to increase their focus on relevant quality improvement (QI) activities.

Design: The study was conducted from March to December 2015 with volunteer general practices from a range of Australian primary care settings. We used a mixed-methods approach in two parts.

Who's responsible for the care of women during and after a pregnancy affected by gestational diabetes?

Despite its increasing incidence and high conferred risk to women and their children, gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) is managed inconsistently during and after pregnancy due to an absence of a systemic approach to managing these women. New guidelines for GDM testing and diagnosis are based on stronger evidence, but raise concerns about increased workloads and confusion in a landscape of multiple, conflicting guidelines. Postnatal care and long-term preventive measures are particularly fragmented, with no professional group taking responsibility for this crucial role.

Primary care of women after gestational diabetes mellitus: mapping the evidence-practice gap.

Objective: To determine the extent to which preventive activities, including the ordering of an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) between 6 and 12 weeks of birth, are integrated into women's primary care postpartum visits after a gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM)-affected pregnancy.

Design And Setting: Prospective survey and retrospective chart audit of general practices that provide maternity shared care in south-east Queensland, July 2011 to June 2012.

Participants: General practitioners (n = 38) and medical records of women to whom they provided care (n = 43 women).

Advocacy for strengthening civil registration and vital statistics.

This article has presented the key elements of the advocacy process and the steps to consider in developing an advocacy campaign. There are compelling reasons for engaging in advocacy, particularly as civil registration systems in many countries have progressed very little over the past 50 years. Lack of awareness of the benefits for individuals and governments has contributed to a vicious cycle of under development of civil registration and vital statistics systems.