Randomised Controlled Trial of a Customised Text Messaging and Activity Monitor Program for Lifestyle Improvement after Gestational Diabetes.

Gestational diabetes (GDM) is associated with a long-term risk of diabetes. We aimed to determine whether a text-messaging-based lifestyle support program would improve diabetes risk factors following GDM. Women with GDM were randomised following delivery to receive four text messages per week supporting a healthy lifestyle and parenting for 6 months, with feedback from an activity monitor (intervention), or to receive the activity monitor only (control).

Young people's experiences of the Northern Rivers 2017 flood and its effects on their mental health.

Objective: To explore young people's (YP) experiences of catastrophic flooding in the Northern Rivers area of northern NSW in 2017 and its effect on their mental health.

Design: Content analysis of free-text survey responses (written responses to open questions, rather than selecting a response option).

Setting: Northern Rivers NSW.

Methodological pluralism for better evaluations of complex interventions: lessons from evaluating an innovation platform in Australia.

Complex interventions, such as innovation platforms, pose challenges for evaluators. A variety of methodological approaches are often required to build a more complete and comprehensive understanding of how complex interventions work. In this paper, we outline and critically appraise a methodologically pluralist evaluation of an innovation platform to strengthen primary care for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians.

Scaling up population health interventions from decision to sustainability - a window of opportunity? A qualitative view from policy-makers.

Background: While known efficacious preventive health interventions exist, the current capacity to scale up these interventions is limited. In recent years, much attention has focussed on developing frameworks and methods for scale-up yet, in practice, the pathway for scale-up is seldom linear and may be highly dependent on contextual circumstances. Few studies have examined the process of scaling up from decision to implementation nor examined the sustainability of scaled-up interventions.

The Intervention Scalability Assessment Tool: a pilot study assessing five interventions for scalability.

Objectives: This study tested the utility of the Intervention Scalability Assessment Tool (ISAT) with real-world interventions considered for scale-up in the Australian context. We explored user perceptions of the usefulness of the ISAT in making scalability decisions and conducted an analysis of completed ISATs. Type of program/service: The ISAT was designed to assist policy makers/practitioners to make structured and reflective assessments of the potential scalability of their interventions.

Using developmental evaluation to enhance continuous reflection, learning and adaptation of an innovation platform in Australian Indigenous primary healthcare.

Effective efforts to strengthen health systems need diverse, multi-stakeholder networks working together on complex or 'wicked' problems such as prevention and control of chronic diseases, solutions to which go beyond the role and capability of one organisation. The contextual complexities inherent in 'wicked' problems mean that solutions warrant a systems approach that encompasses innovation and new ways of thinking about, facilitating and implementing collective decision-making processes and change practices.Innovation platforms are a mechanism for facilitating communication and collaboration among diverse stakeholders, promoting joint action and stimulating innovation.

Emotional exhaustion among regional doctors in training and the application of international guidelines on sustainable employability management for organisations.

Objective The first objective of this study was to assess the associations between individual, community and hospital factors with emotional exhaustion (EE) among rural Australian doctors in training (DITs); the second objective was to apply criteria from an international standard that measures sustainable employability in organisations. Methods A cross-sectional study of 70 DITs was conducted. Odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of EE across individual, community and organisational factors were calculated.

Key Performance Indicators for program scale-up and divergent practice styles: a study from NSW, Australia.

Implementing programs at scale has become a vital part of the government response to the continuing childhood obesity epidemic. We are studying the largest ever scale-up of school and child care obesity prevention programs in Australia. Health promotion teams support primary schools and early childhood services in their area to achieve a number of specified, evidence-based practices aimed at organizational changes to improve healthy eating and physical activity.

What isn't measured isn't done - eight years with no progress in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adult influenza and pneumococcal vaccination.

Objectives: To describe and compare vaccination coverage for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (hereafter referred to as Indigenous) adults in 2004-05 and 2012-13, including the impact of national vaccination funding initiatives.

Methods: National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health cross-sectional surveys - 2004-05 (n=5,757) and 2012-13 (n=5,482) - were compared. Self-reported influenza and pneumococcal vaccination coverage among Indigenous adults was analysed by age, remoteness, gender and risk factor status.