Commission on Excellence and Innovation in Health

Adolescent Transition Care Statewide Clinical Network

The Adolescent Transition Care SCN aims to partner with young people to ensure healthcare is designed to suit young people and doesn't impact on their normal healthy adolescent development.

Adolescent Transition Care Update

Current Projects

The Adolescent Transition Care Statewide Clinical Network are excited to announce two projects, that have commenced, with the aim to improve the adolescent transition journey for young people in South Australia. The two projects are:

  • The Adolescent Transition Framework and Action Plan. The purpose of the framework and action plan is to improve health outcomes for young people with life-long disability and or chronic conditions in South Australia through improved quality, continuity and consistency of adolescent transition care.
  • Heath Journey Mapping project. This is a research project with the aim is to identify the challenges faced by young people with complex medical conditions in transition from child to adult health services in South Australia. In particular:
    • The needs of young people during transition
    • The elements that contribute to a successful transition

We recognise that young people are best placed to be involved in decisions and suggest solutions about the issues that affect them so both of these projects will be engaging youth to be actively involved in these projects.

There will be expressions of interest for young people who are interested in contributing to the projects and providing a voice for young people with a chronic illness in South Australia.

Hear from Damon Fenech about the Statewide Adolescent Transition Care Clinical Network as part of the 2022 CEIH Con­ver­sa­tion Series

Statewide Adolescent Transition Care Clinical Network Steering Committee
Dr Jem­ma Ander­sonCo-Chair
Dr Jen­na PatersonCo-Chair
Ms Abby EdwardsClin­i­cal Care Coor­di­na­tor, South Aus­tralian Intel­lec­tu­al Dis­abil­i­ty Service
Ms Allyson RappensbergNurse Con­sul­tant MACS Clin­ic, CALHN
Dr Bet­ty-Jean Dee-PriceResearch (UNSW) ses­sion­al work (Flinders), Flinders Uni­ver­si­ty, Uni­ver­si­ty of New South Wales
Prof. Cather­ine HillCon­sul­tant Rheuma­tol­o­gist, CALHN
Dr Chad CollinsGP Liai­son, Ade­laide Pri­ma­ry Health Network
Ms Chari LaneENT Nurse Prac­ti­tion­er, WCHN
Mr Damon FenechNurs­ing Ser­vice Man­ag­er, RDNS
Ms Dianne EdwardsNurse Prac­ti­tion­er, SALHN
Dr Emi­ly Rox­burghGP Liai­son and Inter­gra­tion Consultant
Mrs Georgina Pater­sonNurse Unit Man­ag­er, Tho­raci­cs OPD, CALHN
Dr Jes­si­ca SmithGP/​Rehabilitation Physi­cian, SAL­HN & NALHN
Ms Jil­lian Lyon-GreenNurse Con­sul­tant- Diabetes
Asso­ciate Pro­fes­sor Josephine ThomasCon­sul­tant Gen­er­al Physi­cian NALHN
Ms Kate TolleyNurse Con­sul­tant, WCHN
Ms Katha­line SpaldingNurs­ing Direc­tor, WCHN
Dr Mark FriswellCon­sul­tant, WCHN
Ms Mary But­lerPro­fes­sor, UniSA
Ms Kate TurpinNurse prac­ti­tion­er — Long term fol­low up/​transition, WCHN
Dr Michael Brif­fa

Pal­lia­tive Care Ser­vices Con­sul­tant, SAL­HN & WCHN 

Ms Pauline SpenceClin­i­cal Project Man­ag­er — New WCHN Project
Ms Rebec­ca Cook­seyPae­di­atric Rheumatologist
Dr Sel­ma TorronenPae­di­atric Nephrol­o­gist, WCHN

Ms Suja­ta Mylvaganam

Coor­di­na­tor Youth Men­tal Health Con­sul­ta­tion Liai­son Ser­vice, Rur­al and Remote Men­tal Health Service
Ms Susan NumPsy­chol­o­gist, Youth Men­tal Health Service
Ms Usha RitchieAsso­ciate Direc­tor of Phar­ma­cy, CALHN

includ­ing rotat­ing mem­bers from the CEIH Youth Advi­so­ry Group.

Dr Jemma Anderson

Staff Specialist and Medical Unit Head, Adolescent Ward, Women's and Children's Hospital

Dr Jem­ma Ander­son is a staff spe­cial­ist and med­ical unit head of the ado­les­cent ward at the Wom­en’s and Chil­dren’s Hos­pi­tal and the first Ado­les­cent Physi­cian in South Aus­tralia. She also holds a spe­cial­ist qual­i­fi­ca­tion in Pae­di­atric Endocrinol­o­gy and is a senior lec­tur­er with the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ade­laide. She is the cur­rent edi­tor for ado­les­cent med­i­cine with the Jour­nal of Pae­di­atrics and Child Health. Jem­ma has a long­stand­ing pas­sion for sup­port­ing healthy ado­les­cent devel­op­ment and is com­mit­ted to com­mu­ni­ty and youth engage­ment in devel­op­ing mod­els of care and research for young peo­ple. She is the lead for Pae­di­atric Eat­ing Dis­or­ders and Gen­der Med­i­cine at the Wom­en’s and Chil­dren’s Hos­pi­tal and has a spe­cial inter­est in sup­port­ing and empow­er­ing young peo­ple in their tran­si­tion across health services. 

Dr Jenna Paterson

General and Acute Care Medicine Adult Physician, Northern Adelaide Local Health Network

Dr Jen­na Pater­son is a spe­cial­ist in adult inter­nal med­i­cine and peri­op­er­a­tive med­i­cine. She is cur­rent­ly a staff spe­cial­ist in the Gen­er­al Med­i­cine Unit at the Lyell McEwin Hos­pi­tal and Mod­bury Hos­pi­tal in South Aus­tralia. She has com­plet­ed a Grad­u­ate Diplo­ma in Ado­les­cent Health and Wel­fare to bet­ter enable her to pro­vide holis­tic and ongo­ing med­ical care to younger patients with com­plex med­ical comor­bidi­ties who are tran­si­tion­ing into the adult health­care sys­tem. She is pas­sion­ate about engag­ing and empow­er­ing young peo­ple in their tran­si­tion across health ser­vices, and in bring­ing the whole health­care team togeth­er to help smooth the often dif­fi­cult and chal­leng­ing move­ment between health sectors.

Statewide Ado­les­cent Tran­si­tion Care Clin­i­cal Net­work Vision

The Ado­les­cent Tran­si­tion Care Clin­i­cal Net­work has a vision for young peo­ple to access care which:

  • meets their needs
  • empow­ers them to have an ongo­ing say in its devel­op­ment and evaluation
  • is eas­i­ly accessible
  • is con­tin­u­ous­ly improv­ing and;
  • seam­less across all providers of healthcare.

Statewide Ado­les­cent Tran­si­tion Care Clin­i­cal Net­work Goals

  • Improve access to services
  • Seam­less tran­si­tion, qual­i­ty and deliv­ery of care to young people
  • Young peo­ple are part of the sys­tem and design
  • Qual­i­ty improvement.

Ado­les­cent Tran­si­tion Care Net­work Vision and Aims Easy Read (581 KB, PDF)

Addi­tion­al Doc­u­ments and Information

Ado­les­cent Tran­si­tion Care Net­work Work Streams

To read more about the Steer­ing Com­mit­tees approach and mea­sures of suc­cess, see Ado­les­cent Tran­si­tion Care Work Streams

Terms of Reference

Edu­ca­tion Resources

Ado­les­cent Brain Development

Adverse Expe­ri­ences on the Devel­op­ing Brain

Com­mis­sion­er for Chil­dren and Young People

Have a question?

Or want to know more about the Ado­les­cent Tran­si­tion Care Statewide Clin­i­cal Net­work?
Please email CEIH.​AdolescentTransition@​sa.​gov.​au

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