The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Ophthalmologists (RANZCO) recently submitted our 2021-2022 pre-budget submission to the government.
Our submission is aimed to enhance equitable service provision across Australia, ensuring patient safety and a sustainable ophthalmology workforce, covering the following priorities:
- Ending avoidable blindness through improving access to sight saving care, and the development of Collaborative Care Referral Pathways.
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander eye health through a call for increased funding, a partnership approach between government and communities, and improving service delivery by better understanding the patient journey.
- Improving rural and remote service delivery by growing the ophthalmology workforce and more MBS support for telehealth.
- Population health issues arising from climate change and the Covid-19 pandemic.
- Improved Doctor wellbeing, particularly in mental health and overall health and wellbeing.
RANZCO looks forward to supporting the government improve all facets of eye health across the Australian population, with a particular focus on ending avoidable blindness and improving patient access to sight-saving procedures.