Issues
Volume 220 Issue 6
Editor's choice
Health and climate change: call for sustainability in Australia's health care sector
This issue of the MJA returns to the topic of climate and health, with the publication of the 2023 report of the MJA–Lancet Countdown on health and climate change, focusing on the need for sustainability in Australia's health care sector (doi: 10.5694/mja2.52245). This is the sixth report in this series. The Countdown on health and climate change in Australia was established in 2017, producing its first national assessment in 2018. The report comes after yet another catastrophic year for the climate with 2023 having been the hottest year on record (https://www.climate.gov/news‐features/understanding‐climate/climate‐change‐global‐temperature) and following extreme floods in Australia in 2022. The early reports appeared in the context of the severe 2017–2019 droughts; this year's report “thus [completes] a picture of Australia's drought‐to‐flood cycle”. As in previous years, the report tracks progress on five broad domains: health hazards, exposures and impacts; adaptation, planning and resilience for health; mitigation actions and health co‐benefits; economics and finance; and public and political engagement. In the run‐up to 2030, the next phase of the countdown is even more critical. Although they observe signs of progress, including the release of Australia's first National Health and Climate Strategy, the authors note that their “results highlight the health and economic costs of inaction on health and climate change”. The MJA will continue to publish on health and climate change, and we encourage submissions in this area. Elsewhere in the issue, Pemberton and colleagues highlight the growing challenge of care of older people within the prison population, especially at the end of life (doi: 10.5694/mja2.52240). Reports regularly emerge of patients being subject to restraints, even when very frail and in palliative care, despite doctors calling for restraints to be removed. As the authors conclude, it seems clear that when prisoners enter hospital or palliative care, the justice and health care systems are directly challenging each other. The authors note that this is an important reminder that international standards require “prisoners should be entitled to the same level of health care as the wider community”. Finally, an editorial and research article explore how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander caregivers are involved in parenting programs. In their scoping review of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) (doi: 10.5694/mja2.52198), MacDonald and colleagues assess the extent to which Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parents, particularly fathers, are included in trials of parenting programs in Australia and whether these programs are culturally appropriate. The answer is unfortunately that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families have been engaged in such studies to only a very limited degree. The authors' conclusions are sobering: “We could not identify any RCTs in which the participation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander fathers was reported, and few interventions were tailored to the cultural needs of Indigenous people.” In their editorial, Sherriff and Gwynn reinforce this concern (doi: 10.5694/mja2.52238), although they note that “RCTs are generally not the preferred method of assessment for Aboriginal communities because direct benefits are not evident and they do not conform with cultural views on reciprocity and community‐centred approaches”. As they conclude, “Aboriginal ways of knowing, being, and doing must be privileged across all aspects of research in their communities”.
Virginia Barbour
Perspectives
The 2023 report of the MJA–Lancet Countdown on health and climate change: sustainability needed in Australia's health care sector
There are signs of progress, but a greater sense of urgency is still required
Paul J Beggs · Stefan Trueck · Martina K Linnenluecke · Hilary Bambrick · Anthony G Capon · Ivan C Hanigan · Nicolas Borchers Arriagada · Troy J Cross · Sharon Friel · Donna Green · Maddie Heenan · Ollie Jay · Harry Kennard · Arunima Malik · Celia McMichael · Mark Stevenson · Sotiris Vardoulakis · Tran N Dang · Gail Garvey · Raymond Lovett · Veronica Matthews · Dung Phung · Alistair J Woodward · Marina B Romanello · Ying Zhang
Call to end shackling of hospitalised palliative prisoner patients
It is essential that the practice of restraining dying prisoner patients is reviewed and overhauled so that prisoners can be granted the fundamental human right of a dignified death
Lara Pemberton · Stacey Panozzo · Jennifer Philip
Medical education
PEG‐GCSF‐induced aortitis in a patient with breast cancer: distinguishing between infective and immune‐mediated aortitis
A 64-year-old woman presented with non-neutropenic fever and back pain one day after the first cycle of neoadjuvant chemotherapy
Luigi Zolio · Prudence A Francis · Nava Ferdowsi
Erratum
Erratum
Tunnicliffe DJ, Bateman S, Arnold‐Chamney M, et al. Recommendations for culturally safe clinical kidney care for First Nations Australians: a guideline summary. Med J Aust 2023; https://doi.org/10.5694/mja2.52114 This is an erratum for Recommendations for culturally safe clinical kidney care for First Nations Australians: a guideline summary. In this Guideline summary, the author Ro‐Anne Stirling‐Kelly was accidentally removed from the authors list. The complete list should read: David J Tunnicliffe1,2 Samantha Bateman3,4 Melissa Arnold‐Chamney3 Karen M Dwyer5 Martin Howell1,2 Azaria Gebadi1,2 Shilpa Jesudason6 Janet Kelly3 Kelly Lambert7,8 Sandawan William Majoni9,10 Dora Oliva11 Kelli J Owen3,12 Odette Pearson13,14 Elizabeth Rix3,15 Ieyesha Roberts1,2 Ro‐Anne Stirling‐Kelly1,2,16 Kimberly Taylor17 Gary A Wittert3,18 Katherine Widders1,2 Adela Yip1,2 Jonathan Craig10 Richard K Phoon1,19 1 University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW. 2 Centre for Kidney Research, Children's Hospital at Westmead, Sydney, NSW. 3 University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA. 4 Central and Northern Adelaide Renal and Transplantation Services, Central Adelaide Local Health Network, Adelaide, SA. 5 Deakin University, Geelong, VIC. 6 Kidney Health Australia, Adelaide, SA. 7 University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW. 8 Illawarra Health and Medical Research Institute, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, NSW. 9 Royal Darwin Hospital, Darwin, NT. 10 Flinders University, Adelaide, SA. 11 Drug and Alcohol Services, South Australia Health, Adelaide, SA. 12 Central and Northern Adelaide Renal and Transplantation, Royal Adelaide Hospital, Adelaide, SA. 13 Wardliparingga Aboriginal Health Equity, South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute, Adelaide, SA. 14 Cancer Research Institute, University of South Australia, Adelaide, SA. 15 Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW. 16 NSW Health Mid‐North Coast Local Health District, Sydney, NSW. 17 Aboriginal Communities and Families Health Research Alliance, South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute, Adelaide, SA. 18 Royal Adelaide Hospital, Adelaide, SA. 19 Westmead Hospital, Sydney, NSW. https://doi.org/10.5694/mja2.52243
Editorials
Interventions for reducing the prescribing of pharmaceutical opioids in Australia: are they effectively reducing opioid harm?
Capturing the intended and unintended outcomes of interventions is important for fully assessing their impact
Suzanne Nielsen · Ting Xia
Yarning together: toward targeted, co‐designed parenting programs for Aboriginal Australians
Aboriginal ways of knowing, being, and doing must be privileged across all aspects of research in their communities
Simone Sherriff · Josephine D Gwynn
Research
The impact of tightened prescribing restrictions for PBS-subsidised opioid medicines and the introduction of half-pack sizes, Australia, 2020–21: an interrupted time series analysis
The introduction of new PBS rules for subsidised opioid medicines were followed by a decline in subsidised dispensing
Forrest C Koch · Jake Olivier · Jonathan Brett · Nicholas A Buckley · Natasa Gisev · Sallie Pearson · Benjamin Daniels
Long COVID in a highly vaccinated but largely unexposed Australian population following the 2022 SARS‐CoV‐2 Omicron wave: a cross‐sectional survey
General practices play a major role in managing the burden of long COVID in Australia
Mulu Woldegiorgis · Gemma Cadby · Sera Ngeh · Rosemary J Korda · Paul K Armstrong · Jelena Maticevic · Paul Knight · Andrew Jardine · Lauren E Bloomfield · Paul V Effler
Scoping review
The participation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander parents in Australian trials of parenting programs for improving children's health: a scoping review
The specific needs and interests of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families have not generally been considered in Australian trials of parenting programs
Jake MacDonald · Myles Young · Briana Barclay · Stacey McMullen · James Knox · Philip Morgan
Research letters
Post‐COVID‐19 condition symptoms 12 and 24 months after COVID‐19 during the first month of the pandemic in Melbourne: a cohort study
People frequently report somatic, psychiatric, and neurocognitive symptoms consistent with post-COVID-19 up to 24 months after COVID-19
Dorothy Q Ling · Grace Gibney · Fiona James · Natasha E Holmes · Kyra YL Chua
The uptake of long‐acting depot buprenorphine for treating opioid dependence in Australia, 2019–2022: longitudinal sales data analysis
There was a marked shift from daily opioid agonist treatments to long-acting depot buprenorphine during 2019–2022
Nicholas Lintzeris · Victoria Hayes · Adrian J Dunlop
Letter
Prevalence, pathogenesis and spectrum of neurological symptoms in COVID‐19 and post‐COVID‐19 syndrome
Josef Finsterer · Fulvio A Scorza
The role of medical colleges and member organisations in advancing women in health care leadership
Jenny Proimos · Jacqueline A Boyle · Belinda Garth · Erwin Loh · Helena J Teede
Women in medical leadership: has the COVID‐19 crisis heightened the glass cliff?
Melissa A Wheeler · Laksmi S Govindasamy
Response to the ASHM 2023 statement on the use of doxy‐PEP in Australia: considerations and recommendations
Sara FE Bell · Emma L Sweeney · Fabian YS Kong · David M Whiley · Catriona S Bradshaw · Jacob A Tickner
Australia's surgical research: from the laboratory to health systems
Maria C Inacio · Francis Geronimo · Virginia Barbour
Contemporary management of advanced colorectal cancer: the Australian experience
Kilian GM Brown · Nabila Ansari · Michael J Solomon
Prosthetic joint infection diagnosis in an age of changing clinical patterns of infection and new technologies
Joshua S Davis · David Dewar · Laurens Manning
Enhanced recovery after surgery: an update for the generalist
Andrew G Hill · James Jin