November 2003

Conference by video brings 300 together across four states

More than 300 Victorian rural allied health practitioners and their peers around Australia took part in a Falls, Mobility and Balance videoconference.

The videoconference—to 35 sites in Victoria, Tasmania, Western Australia and New South Wales—was a Department of Human Services-funded Rural Allied Health Continuing Professional Education project.

It was run jointly by the Victorian Healthcare Association and the Allied Health Professions Alliance to develop and deliver multi-disciplinary education to rural allied health practitioners.

Speakers and topics included:

• National Ageing Research Institute Senior Research Fellow (physiotherapist) Keith Hill—evidence-based practice in falls and the role of physiotherapy in prevention;

• Occupational therapist at Western Health’s Falls and Mobility Clinic Sue Harman—prevention is better than cure/clinic and home-based assessments;

• Northern Health Health Services Manager (podiatry) Rebecca Jessup—feet, footwear and falls/the role of podiatry in reducing falls risk in the elderly;

• Senior optometrist at the Victorian College of Optometry Anthea Cochrane—visual impairment and falls;

• Dietitian Associate Professor Caryl Nowson—vitamin D, falls and fracture;

Practitioners provided feedback on the presentations that updated their discipline-specific knowledge and increased their understanding of the role of other allied health practitioners concerned with falls, mobility and balance.

Participants endorsed the videoconference’s multi-disciplinary approach as reinforcing the holistic nature of assessment and intervention.

Correct footwear, exposure to Vitamin D, the importance of checking outside paths during home safety appraisals and vision assessment were considered the most important falls prevention messages.

• Power point presentations are available in the conference unit section on the VHA website–www.vha.org.au. For further information contact Clare O’Reilly on 8606 4607 or email clare.oreilly@vha.org.au.