OPTIMISE

Collaborative Improvement of Primary Health Care Delivery to the Australian Refugee Community

Centre: CHSD

Funder: National Health & Medical Research Council

Start year: 2016

End year: 2020

Overview: OPTIMISE is a four-year research project funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council’s Partnerships for Better Health Grants Scheme, which brings together academics and organisations from across the refugee health sector to develop and test innovative solutions to improve the delivery of accessible, coordinated and high quality primary care to refugees and asylum-seekers. Working in collaboration with Monash University, University of NSW, and a range of relevant partners, we are implementing and evaluating a model of practice facilitation across three regions in Australia that receive a high number of refugee and asylum-seeker settlement: North Western Melbourne, South Eastern Melbourne, and South-Western Sydney.

Partners in our region (North Western Melbourne) include:

• North Western Melbourne PHN
• cohealth (a large community health centre)
• AMES (Settlement Services)
• Department of Health & Human Services Victoria
• the Victorian Refugee Health Network.

Team members (internal/external): Virginia Lewis, Gerald Marsh