Statewide Surgical and Perioperative Care Clinical Network

The Sur­gi­cal and Peri­op­er­a­tive Care Clin­i­cal Net­work was estab­lished in 2021, with the aim to iden­ti­fy, address and improve key sys­tem pri­or­i­ties for South Aus­tralians requir­ing sur­gi­cal services.

New Opti­mised Pre-Sur­gi­cal Care Frame­work for SA

In a South Aus­tralian first, the Statewide Sur­gi­cal and Peri­op­er­a­tive Care Clin­i­cal Net­work (SSPC­CN) has devel­oped an Opti­mised Pre-Sur­gi­cal Care (OPSC) Frame­work for patients under­go­ing an elec­tive surgery procedure. 

Through a struc­tured approach to assess­ing patient risk, the OPSC Frame­work pro­vides rec­om­mend­ed pre-sur­gi­cal inter­ven­tions to opti­mise a patient’s health pri­or to under­go­ing an elec­tive sur­gi­cal pro­ce­dure. Suc­cess­ful opti­mi­sa­tion of patients’ health may improve sur­gi­cal out­comes and, in some cas­es, elim­i­nate the need for surgery altogether. 

The SSPC­CN facil­i­tat­ed a suc­cess­ful work­shop in Sep­tem­ber 2022 involv­ing stake­hold­ers from across the South Aus­tralian health sec­tor to finalise the Frame­work and iden­ti­fy bar­ri­ers and enablers to imple­men­ta­tion of the approach across SA. Ear­ly oppor­tu­ni­ties dis­cussed includ­ed lever­ag­ing the cur­rent e‑referrals and Clin­i­cal Pri­ori­ti­sa­tion Cri­te­ria work occur­ring in the system. 

A fol­low-up work­shop was held in May 2023 with a broad range of stake­hold­ers, from clin­i­cians to con­sumers, across var­i­ous parts of the health sec­tor includ­ing state gov­ern­ment, pri­ma­ry health care, research and non-gov­­ern­­ment organ­i­sa­tions. This ses­sion iden­ti­fied and pri­ori­tised sus­tain­able, equi­table and scal­able oppor­tu­ni­ties to imple­ment the Frame­work in South Australia. 

Oth­er Projects

SCOPES: Sur­veil­lance Colonoscopy Opti­mised Pre­ven­tion via an E‑System

This project will devel­op, val­i­date and imple­ment a dig­i­tal inter­ven­tion sur­veil­lance pro­gram to man­age the grow­ing demand for colono­scopies, while estab­lish­ing a data reg­istry for future can­cer research. 

Hear from Dr Phil Wor­ley about the Statewide Sur­gi­cal and Peri­op­er­a­tive Care Clin­i­cal Net­work as part of the 2022 CEIH Con­ver­sa­tion Series

Network Lead

Dr Phil Worley

Statewide Surgical and Perioperative Care Clinical Network Steering Committee

Dr Ben­jamin Teague

Gen­er­al Sur­geon, North­ern Ade­laide Local Health Network

Dr Bernard Car­ney

Plas­tic, Cos­met­ic and Recon­struc­tive Surgeon

Ms Caitlin Davis

Dietit­ian, South­ern Ade­laide and Cen­tral Ade­laide Local Health Networks

Dr Chetan Pradhan

Con­sul­tant Sur­geon & Direc­tor of Surgery, River­land Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal; Clin­i­cal Lead Surgery, Rur­al Sup­port Service

Dr Conor Marron

Con­sul­tant Vas­cu­lar Sur­geon, Cen­tral Ade­laide and North­ern Ade­laide Local Health Networks

Mrs Emma Lyndon

CEO/​Director of Nurs­ing, Ade­laide Day Surgery

A/​Prof Jayme Bennetts

Direc­tor, Car­dio­tho­racic Sur­gi­cal Unit, South­ern Ade­laide Local Health Network

Ms Joanne McMillan

Safe­ty and Qual­i­ty Coor­di­na­tor, Crit­i­cal Care and Peri­op­er­a­tive Ser­vices, Cen­tral Ade­laide Local Health Network

Dr Kate Drummond

Senior Staff Spe­cial­ist Anaes­thetist, Cen­tral Ade­laide Local Health Network

Dr Kathryn Materne

Gen­er­al Prac­ti­tion­er, Dul­wich Fam­i­ly Practice

Mr Kris­t­ian Sanchez

Nurse Lead Surgery, Cen­tral Ade­laide Local Health Network

Ms Mandy Nolan

Direc­tor of Allied Health, Cal­vary Health Care

Dr Mark Markou

Direc­tor Anaes­the­sia and Pain Man­age­ment, South­ern Ade­laide Local Health Network

Dr Mar­tin Altmann

Gen­er­al Prac­ti­tion­er, Bridge Clinic

Ms Moni­ka Marzec

Con­sumer representative

Ms Sharyn Coles

Con­sumer representative

Dr Shiv­an­gi Jog

Gen­er­al and Trau­ma Sur­geon, Cen­tral Ade­laide Local Health Network

Statewide Sur­gi­cal and Peri­op­er­a­tive Care Clin­i­cal Net­work Vision

To iden­ti­fy and address key sys­tem pri­or­i­ties that may both pre­vent the require­ment for sur­gi­cal ser­vices and improve expe­ri­ence and out­comes for all South Aus­tralians by ensur­ing access, appro­pri­ate­ness and effi­cien­cy across their sur­gi­cal journey.

Statewide Sur­gi­cal and Peri­op­er­a­tive Care Clin­i­cal Net­work Goal

The Sur­gi­cal and Peri­op­er­a­tive Care Net­work aims to improve health out­comes and expe­ri­ences for all South Aus­tralians across the sur­gi­cal jour­ney, and to decrease the require­ment for sur­gi­cal services.

Have a question?

Or want to know more about the Sur­gi­cal Peri­op­er­a­tive Statewide Clin­i­cal Net­work?
Please email CEIH.​SurgicalPerioperative@​sa.​gov.​au