COMMUNITY ADVISORY COMMITTEES
Health Issues Centre’s is funded by the Victorian Department of Human Services (DHS) to support the development of Community Advisory Committee (CACs) in 14 Metropolitan Health Services and five regional health services. As part of this project, Health Issues Centre convenes forums with CAC support staff and members and facilitates a Resource Officers network as well as delivering training and support to CAC members.
Resource Officers' Network
The Resource Officer’s Network meets quarterly, and includes a representative from DHS. In these meetings, an update on the activities, issues and challenges for each CAC is a standing item. The meetings provide Resource Officers with a forum for networking, problem solving, and discussing issues for individual CACs, and for the strategic development of the CACs more broadly.
One-on-One Support
Health Issues Centre also provides one on one support to individual Community Advisory Committees. Such as training and resources as part of orientation programs for new CAC members, phone advice and information about resources and support for consumer participation to staff and consumers from health services on request.
Consumers On Line
If you are Community Advisory Committee (CAC) member you can join Consumers on Line a computer mediated group set up and moderated by Health Issues Centre. See flyer for more information.
Committed to Participation
On the 20 May 2008, Health Issues Centre held a one-day forum for health consumers who participate on committees to share their experiences. The conference was held at Victoria University, Melbourne and was attended by 105 Participants.
The aim of the forum was to provide people with an opportunity to:
improve the effectiveness of advisory committees and consumer participation
The majority of participants that attended were consumers with the presentation being delivered almost entirely by consumers. See forum program for more information. A list of presentations given on at the forum is below. More will be added as they become available. A report of this forum that describes the collaborative process undertaken with consumers to develop the content and structure of the forum, the forum abstract, presenter bios, the discussions that took place, the recommendations that developed and a summary of the evaluations is also available.
SESSION 1 - CONSUMERS PAYMENTS
Consumer perspectives on whether or not consumers on committees should be paid
Stand up- be counted- be paid- Can hospitals afford not to pay?
Paying for Consumer Participation: A Matter of Choice!
SESSION 2 - THE ROLE OF THE CAC
Governance for the Community Coming soon
Melbourne Health CAC - Strategically evolves into the future
Reflections of the 2007 Quality and Safety Conference
SESSION 3 - CAC EVALUATION
Evaluation of the CAC to Board of Victorian Public Health Services
SESSION 4 - MARKETING AND RECRUITMENT
Who are they and where do we get them?
The challenge to be visible Coming soon
SESSION 5 – COMMUNICATION
Community Advisory Committees and their Communities of Interest
How do you ensure respect, open and honest communication between resource officers, chairs, executive sponsors and management?
SESSION 6 - THE CAC AND THE HEALTH PROFESSIONAL
Health organisations and CAC members in harmony: can we do it?
Beating the path to health professionals – do they know what we’re trying to do and if not, why not?
Resources
One way Health Issues Centre provides support to the CACs is providing access to resources that support Resource Offices and CAC members in their roles. New resources will be added to this page as they become available.
Copyright
All material contained on this website is subject to copyright. Printing one copy of a document on this website for the purpose of personal research or study is permitted. See copyright notice for further details.
