RICK HIND, HOST: If you have been listening to 1057 ABC Darwin for a while, you’ll know the important work headspace does, especially for young people who are struggling. Jo Laverty hosted a broadcast from headspace just before she headed off to Adelaide. Well, that work has been recognised the best way possible with money to keep going and expand what they can offer – that’s the day after R U OK? Day. Emma McBride is the Assistant Federal Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention and joins us in the studio. Emma, Good morning.
ASSISTANT MINISTER EMMA MCBRIDE: Good to be with you, Rick.
HIND: You had a really important day yesterday for R U OK? Day. Can you talk about what you did?
MCBRIDE: For me in my role, one of the most important things I do is try to listen to local people, to understand what their needs are and to make sure that services that we’re providing from a national level, like headspace, are tailored to meet local needs and fill gaps in services. So today, I’m really pleased to let your listeners know that there’ll be more than a $1 million boost to headspace in Darwin to upgrade their premises to support the important work they do with local young people.
HIND: So that’s building upgrades. headspace Alice Springs will also be getting a fair bit of money as well. So what will those building upgrades do? What will they be able to do with that added space?
MCBRIDE: We need to know that headspace is fit for purpose, that the spaces are safe and welcoming for people and that they have the room for the growing demand. And headspace Darwin is one of the 30 national that will soon be uplifted to a new model called headspace Plus, acknowledging the growing complexity and the increasing demand for services like yours right here in Darwin.
HIND: The NT Eating Disorder Roundtable, that was yesterday. Who did you hear from?
MCBRIDE: We heard from local people, including Louise, who was giving a First Nations perspective about eating disorders, and what we can do as a Commonwealth through the National Eating Disorder Strategy and translating that into local services like Right Care Right Place, which has been piloted in the NT.
HIND: I had a friend who has a daughter with an eating disorder. For treatment, she had to go interstate. How important is it for people to be able to be treated where they live?
MCBRIDE: The most effective treatment is within families and communities. So we need to provide support to families. We met with Jane Rowan from Eating Disorders Families Australia, to make sure that services are tailored to local people and that they can access them easily when they need them most.
HIND: Now, Urgent Care Clinics, what's the latest? Are we getting a new one in the top end?
MCBRIDE: Yes, you will. The Palmerston Urgent Care Clinic, as your listeners would know, was opened back in 2023. And since then, it's seen more than 28,000 local people walk in for free. And I want to acknowledge the advocacy of your local MP and Special Envoy, Luke Gosling. We've announced this week that the tenders will go out through NT Health for the new Medicare Urgent Care Clinic in Darwin. And it'll be up and running in the near future to take pressure off Royal Darwin Hospital and to make sure that more locals can get free walk-in support and care when they need it.
HIND: A lot of health- a lot of aged care supply, as soon as the building is open, it's full. There's just this endless need for healthcare in the Territory. A lot of people don't realise that Royal Darwin Hospital isn't just the busiest building in the top end, it's literally one of the busiest hospitals in the country. Will this Urgent Care Clinic immediately be full, and there'll still be equal pressure on RDH?
MCBRIDE: What we've seen when Medicare Urgent Care Clinics have opened in other communities is that they have taken pressure off the hospital. So the hospital can see the more life-threatening cases where urgent care can deal with the breaks, the sprains, the skin infections, the throat infections. So they help to take the pressure off the hospital and make sure that people can get that urgent but not life-threatening care much more quickly.
HIND: That's the big difference, isn't it? So people will just go to the ED because that's where they'll get treatment come what may, but the Urgent Care Clinic now allows for that kind of treatment where your wife is not in danger.
MCBRIDE: That's exactly right. And we've this through Palmerston – as I said, more than 28,000 people through there. And this will be the ninth urgent care in the NT, and overall, there's been more than 76,000 people that have accessed free walk-in urgent care in the NT since the centres were up and running.
HIND: Now you're on your way to the Urgent Care Clinic in Palmerston. What are you hoping to see there? What are you hoping to hear from the people who work there?
MCBRIDE: What I've heard from people that work in urgent care, particularly the doctors that are working in there, that it's very satisfying to be able to see people, to treat them quickly and see them to be able to go out with the care that they need. And doctors are then able to work to the top of their skills and training. They might be stitching somebody up, they might be plastering somebody. And importantly, urgent care has pathology and medical imaging either under the same roof or nearby. So all of that urgent care can happen on the one spot and at that one time.
HIND: Emma McBride is the Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention for the Federal Government, and is in the top end this week. Emma, thanks so much for coming in.
MCBRIDE: Good to be with you.