Since 2019 Concord Burns Unit has been making significant enhancements to its virtual model of care, providing specialist support to adult burns patients across NSW and the ACT. With the initial implementation of high-definition pan tilt zoom cameras to provide virtual multidisciplinary care at our top six rural referral sites being finalised by 2021, and the subsequent addition of MS Teams and MedSync, Concord Burns Unit has considerably enhanced equity of access and the quality of burns care for rural and regional adult burns patients, irrespective of their location or stage of their burns journey.
An extensive retrospective audit of clinical activity within NSW Teleburns Service at Concord has been undertaken finding that our Nurse Practitioner led service provides more than 2000 virtual consultations per year, with over 300 patients annually. An audit of activity for the 3 years prior and 3 years post implementation of these changes has revealed that Concord TeleBurns has halved the number of rural patients needing to be removed from their homes for Burns Unit hospital admission in addition to the amount of face-to-face clinic visits. Specifically, Concord Burns Unit has seen 234 less admissions and 362 patients able to be managed solely via telehealth, therefore not requiring travel to the Concord Burns Clinic. Qualitative data from the patients and family experiential survey has also expressed a high level of satisfaction for the service.
The NSW Teleburns service at Concord Hospital has considerably improved equity of access to specialist burns care for rural and regional burns patients and ensured that down end clinicians have expert clinical support and education, just a videocall away.