OA and ADA pursue greater collaboration

According to a post on OA’s website, the meeting was attended by acting CEO Ms Kirsty Machon, national policy adviser Mr Simon Hanna, and ADA deputy CEO Ms Eithne Irving and policy adviser Mr Bryan Nguyen.Discussion focused on the future of the workforce in optometry and dentistry, private health insurance, and also how both organisations could jointly lobby the government on issues relevant to both professions – such as workforce pressures.“Under the dand-driven funding model, there is a high dand for both optometry and dentistry courses, which puts pressure on the respective workforces,” Machon said.“We have previously suggested there should be the capacity to review and potentially cap optometry undergraduate places to ensure the workforce is sustainable and discussed this issue in common with the dental profession. We will also be working together to ensure that better information is provided to consumers about their private health insurance policy.”OA has also released details from a Skilled Occupations List meeting attended by Hanna, at which he and several other allied health professionals lobbied representatives from the Department of Immigration for roval from the list.“We advocated that our current workforce supply is sufficient for the dands of the sector, and highlighted to the department that a new university in Canberra would be starting, which would add extra pressure internally, on top of any optometrists who came from overseas through the Skilled Occupations List,” Hanna said.“Within our submissions to government we have also campaigned to have optometry taken off the Skilled Occupations List, from which dentistry was roved after four years of submissions from the ADA. Our collaboration will allow us to take a leaf out of the ADA’s book and discuss how they worked to have dentistry roved from the list,” he added.Optometrists were reinstated to the Skilled Occupations List in June 2012.