JOANNE RYAN, LALOR MP: A big welcome to the Werribee Medical and Dental Clinic here in Werribee today. I want to welcome Assistant Minister Rebecca White to my patch. We're really excited about this clinic. Obviously, it's an Urgent Care Clinic as well as being a ForHealth Medical Clinic, and it's also the endometriosis and pelvic pain clinic here as well as a home to Evoca Women's Health. So really excited to have the Assistant Minister here to celebrate the opening of the 33 endometriosis and pelvic pain clinics around the country.
REBECCA WHITE, ASSISTANT MINISTER FOR HEALTH AND AGEING: Thank you, Jo. Thanks, for having us in your beautiful electorate. And thank you very much for joining us Dr Myra to have a chat in a moment about working as a clinician and Jennifer’s a nurse working in the women’s health space as well.
I'm really excited to be able to stand here in this amazing clinic and talk about the investment that our Labor Government has made in women’s health. As a commitment at the last election, we promised to open an additional 11 Endometriosis and Persistent Pelvic Pain Clinics to bring the total to 33 right across the country. Today, we have reached that milestone. We are now officially operating 33 endometriosis and persistent pelvic pain clinics right around Australia, one in every primary health network. This is an enormous achievement that's been driven by the stories of women who told us that for too long, they thought they'd been dismissed or their health was not taken seriously. The Albanese Labor Government is responding by investing in a number of initiatives across a very significant women's health package of nearly $800 million, including endometriosis and persistent pelvic pain clinics.
Now, these clinics are located right around the country. They provide a service for Australian women where they will be heard and they will be taken seriously because too often, we have heard that they felt dismissed or couldn’t get answers for the way they were feeling and they didn't know who to turn to. The Endometriosis and Persistent Pelvic Pain Clinics provide a place where they can go and speak with a trusted health professional, just like Dr Myra or Nurse Jennifer, and share their concerns and finally go into a process and a treatment plan that can be life-changing. And that's what we've heard from women who've been using these services. Across the country, we've had these services operating since 2023. Today, we've opened the 33rd, and what the women have told us is that for the first time, they're taken seriously. For the first time, in some cases, they finally have a diagnosis. They're getting access to medication through the PBS, which has seen us listing contraceptives, including endometriosis medication, to menopause therapies as well, which means that for just $25, they're able to access those treatments and it has changed their life. And from 1 July, these clinics will all expand to also provide perimenopause and menopause services. So not only today are we celebrating this very special milestone, we're opening all 33 of these clinics across the country, but from 1 July, we're expanding services so that women can finally find the care they deserve and in a way that's affordable for them to access.
I'm going to ask Dr Myra to have a chat now about what she's doing here and how she's supporting women to access the care they need.
DR MYRA MPUNGU, GP: I'm one of the GPs here in Werribee Medical and Dental, but we also run the Women's Clinic. Included is endo, pelvic pain and menopause issue and any other issues with women. We've been running now for a few months, and it's always very full. We get a different spectrum of patients, from the very young to actually the very old. With the older ones, I know are around 50-something looking for management of menopausal symptoms. And then, with the younger one, even a bit on pelvic pain, it's such a common thing. Yeah, and a lot of them, they just come back and say they’re just relieved, at least they were heard. They can put a name to what's going on, then maybe we can look for treatment.
JOURNALIST: And you just touched on it then, but can you just expand a bit on the sort of services that you do provide here for women, particularly those experiencing endometriosis?
MPUNGU: Apart from, of course, meeting them and discussing with them, we do IUD insertions or the implant contraception, menopause, MHRT treatments, and of course pain management.
JOURNALIST: How busy is it here? How many women would you probably treat or see each week, would you say?
MPUNGU: Our clinic is full, from nine in the morning until five. 20-30 patients a day.
JOURNALIST: And had you noticed a gap, I suppose, in the treatment options available for women or the services available? Before these clinics opened, were women struggling to receive that care and treatment that they needed?
MPUNGU: Yes, for sure, there was a gap. And with some, maybe they were just scared to come forward because they lived in other places, and they never got any help. So when this clinic came along, a lot of them, they said, I saw you on the media, internet, so I just come and see what you've done. So, definitely, there was a gap, which we're filling now. It’s going well.
JOURNALIST: I understand too it can take quite a long time for women to get a diagnosis for endometriosis. Can you just explain a bit about why that is, I suppose?
MPUNGU: With endometriosis and pelvic pain, a lot of the symptoms or information comes from what the patient is feeling. Diagnostic work, which typically you would want to rely on an ultrasound scan, but the usual regular ones do not show endometriosis. So, in the past, the one time when they have a definitive diagnosis is when they have a laparoscopy. But now, we have a few deep pelvic scans which can show endometriosis. And in our area, we put around one or two who do that, and Medicare is helping with the payments. They pay 75 per cent. So it's become quite affordable for the patients to get that. And if that doesn't show anything, it doesn't mean there isn't endometriosis going on. So it's the symptoms that are more important. And we help patients to better manage their symptoms. So this is the most important thing to get rid of the pain.
JOURNALIST: So in that case, is it quite common for women to perhaps go undiagnosed, given it’s such a complex condition?
MPUNGU: Yes, yes – very much so. Undiagnosed and dismissed that everyone gets pain and a period and they may be told - just take the Nurofen and forget about it. So until, of course, we all start thinking, yeah, there is something else here, I’m not going to do something else, but it needs to be managed so everyone can also live their normal life without having to be in bed for seven days every month. That's how things end up, by the way.
JOURNALIST: And so how has this investment by the Federal Government helped clinics like this one to just expand the services you can provide, particularly for women with that endo or pelvic pain?
MPUNGU: It has helped in that we've been able to have a focused field and focused people. Our clinic nurse, she's fantastic - arranges all the appointments and so on. And we managed to take our time do it in that sort of environment.
JENNIFER JACKSON, NURSE: I've been working with Evoca for about 18 months now and I work with two of our pelvic pain clinics here in Victoria. The big changes I've seen, particularly since November when the PBS expanded, and it's the ability for women to be able to seek and obtain appropriate treatment. I think a lot of the patients we see in the pelvic pain space, as Dr Myra said, have been dismissed as this is a normal women's problem and you just need to get on with it. And that's part of the reason that their diagnosis is so delayed, is because no one takes it any further. And secondly because, unfortunately, the waiting periods in public hospitals are still quite lengthy, so we’re filling the gap in Evoca in particular, undertaking GP training - so all of our GPs in Evoca clinics have been trained in endometriosis, and I work as a designated nurse for them so we that can provide further education and support for the women and fill in that gap, allow them to be taken seriously and undergo investigations quickly - although there may be a small expense for them for that - and then initiate effective treatments.
And the treatment of endometriosis is multidisciplinary, so a GP practice like this is well set up to be able to provide all those under one roof, to bring in several practitioners that they need with the ability to create a care plan to treat as well, to try and keep all their costs down. Because it's not just one symptom, it’s multiple symptoms through their body that we have to address.
And now with the introduction of menopause, we've seen a great uptake with that here. A lot of that's education and making it a topic that's publicly discussed and not written off as another woman's problem. It is another stage of life for women to go through, and education and support and appropriate therapies can make a big difference to women getting on and living their best life.
JOURNALIST: Alright Rebecca, I'll just ask you a couple more questions if that's all right? So these 33 clinics now all across the country, will they be sort of a permanent fixture from now on?
WHITE: Yeah. Well, the intention is to stand these clinics up, as we have done with all 33 now open, to provide a place for women to go where there’ll be trusted and taken seriously. We've made a commitment in the budget to establish them, and that's a commitment that I know our Government's very determined to continue to support. Because we heard through the Senate inquiry, heard through the voices that were raised through a number of different inquiries that women needed something just like this, and that's why we're responding this way.
JOURNALIST: And it means, I suppose, too, that more women can get access closer to home if there's more clinics all around.
WHITE: We've established 33 clinics, which I'm proud to say are all open now. But we're also funding a lot of training and education for the broader health workforce. Because what I want, at the end of the day, is for any woman anywhere in Australia to be able to walk in and see a health professional and be taken seriously, and know that the person they're speaking with has the skills and education to be able to respond appropriately. So, we funded a lot of programs across the country to support skills and training as well as changes that we're making to the guidelines which instruct practitioners on how to treat endometriosis, perimenopause and menopause, because we understand that not every woman is going to live in close enough access to one of our 33 clinics. But hopefully the GP they are able to see has the training and expertise to help them or refer them to an appropriate service.
JOURNALIST: And just on that training and expertise, what sort of is required for a dedicated endo specialist? I know some women are feeling a little bit, you know, concerned over the Four Corners expose regarding Dr Simon Gordon, so can they have confidence that there's really vigorous training in place for these specialists?
WHITE: So, in response to that appalling story which highlighted significant failings - we have responded by funding the Australian and New Zealand College of Gynaecology and Obstetricians as well as the Royal Australian College of GPs to provide additional training and education to their members. Because we can see that one of the things we can do and we have to do immediately is to make sure that health professionals have the right skills.
Because we know that there are women who feel, at the moment, a little bit concerned about whether they can trust the system, and that's deeply worrying. It's why these clinics, I think, will play a very important role, because they do provide a safe and trusting environment for women to reach out to and seek guidance and support. We've also funded, through each of the primary health networks here in Victoria, navigators for any of the former patients of Simon Gordon to be in touch with so that they can be supported to access a health professional who can sit down and speak to them about their particular treatment, understand their reports that might have been provided through pathology. Because we know, for those women in particular, they have a lot of questions.
So in addition to the work we're doing through the 33 clinics, we are providing an uplift in funding for education and training. There will be medical professionals skilled in understanding, diagnosing endometriosis, because we know that women demand better than what they've currently been receiving.
JOURNALIST: And what sort of extra training is going to be required for these specialists?
WHITE: So the colleges have been funded by the Federal Government to develop that training and they are well placed to do that. They are the credentialled authorities who work with their members to make sure that the training is appropriate to their clinical practice. We trust that they will do that well, and of course we’ll be working with them closely to make sure that’s rolled out in a timely manner.