Agency for Clinical Innovation

New Website Coming

The Agency for Clinical Innovation (ACI) is constructing a new website, to complete its transition from the Greater Metropolitan Clinical Taskforce (GMCT).  If you are unable to locate the information you require within our interim website please contact the relevant ACI contact.

About Us

The ACI is a board-governed statutory health corporation that reports to the NSW Minister for Health and the Director-General of the NSW Department of Health.

Established by the NSW Government in direct response to the Garling Inquiry into Acute Care Services in NSW Public Hospitals, the ACI is building on the work of the Greater Metropolitan Clinical Taskforce (GMCT), and engaging doctors, nurses, allied health professionals, managers and the wider community in the process of designing high quality, safe and cost-effective ways to care for patients within the NSW public health system.

As one of the "pillars of reform" identified by former Commissioner Peter Garling SC, the ACI works closely with the Bureau for Health Information, Clinical Excellence Commission, the Clinical Education and Training Institute and the Cancer Institute NSW.

The Board of the ACI was formally announced on 15 March 2010. The inaugural joint Chair of the ACI was Professor Carol Pollock.  Associate Professor Brian McCaughan AM was announced as the new Chair of the ACI Board on 23 December 2010.

For further details of the Chair and membership of the ACI Board, click here 

For information about the new Board and Chair from December 2010, click here

Contact Us

Agency for Clinical Innovation
Tower A, Level 15, Zenith Centre
821-843 Pacific Highway
Chatswood NSW 2067
Mail: PO Box 699 Chatswood NSW 2057
T +61 2 8644 2200 | F +61 2 8644 2148
E info@aci.health.nsw.gov.au  | www.health.nsw.gov.au/gmct/

Severe Infection and Sepsis

The Agency for Clinical Innovation (ACI) in partnership with the Clinical Excellence Commission and the newly formed Emergency Care Institute are conducting a project to improve the recognition of severe infection and sepsis and promote faster treatment for patients in the Emergency Department and the inpatient wards. Click on the following link for further details:

http://www.cec.health.nsw.gov.au/programs/sepsis

The Greater Metropolitan Clinical Taskforce (GMCT) has been established to promote clinician and consumer involvement in planning and health service delivery.

We are a relatively autonomous organisation working actively with Area Health Services and reporting to the NSW Minister for Health and to the NSW Department of Health via the Deputy Director General and the Director General.

Our ongoing commitment to improving health care in NSW is based upon the principles of clinical governance with a focus on:

• Developing services based on clinical need
• Quality of care and safety for patients
• Equity of access and equity of outcome within the Hospital System
• Clinician / Consumer driven planning

Through the twenty clinical networks chaired by clinicians and involving doctors, nurses, allied health professionals, scientists, managers, and consumers we identify how and where improvements can be made in the particular specialty and implement these changes in association with NSW Health and the Area Health Services.

These networks have annual recurrent funding with a full time or part time Network Manager. Some of the Networks are well established, having received funding from as early as 2002, and employ a number of staff to carry out the objectives of the Network.

The clinical networks achievements are numerous and significant, and have:

• Brought together clinicians from facilities across the greater metropolitan region and beyond to identify the key issues in that specialty
• Established working groups to develop consensus documents to guide next steps
• Developed collaborative approaches – eg. standardised assessment and treatment protocols, models of care, benchmarks for services
• Shared staffing and resources across facilities to improve patient access
• Utilised consumers to keep thinking patient-focussed
• Provided staff training in various forms – conferences, seminars, webcasts, study groups and courses in conjunction with tertiary education institutions, opportunities to work in other facilities etc.
• Introduced uniform data collection systems to provide clinicians with data to guide changes in practice
• Facilitated clinical research and the dissemination of results
• Developed patient resources such as booklets, websites, directories, fact sheets, DVDs etc. to ensure that patients and their carers have a good understanding of the issues they face at diagnosis, during treatment and afterwards.

More Information can be found by following the links on the right to the specific clinical networks as well as by following the links below.