Services to Improve Access is about helping individuals receive appropriate health care resources so they can maintain or improve their health and independence. A number of barriers to access exist and Partnership Health Canterbury is working carefully to design a pathway and funding mechanism to ensure that individuals access the care they need.

Why is this a priority for Partnership Health Canterbury?

Within New Zealand's population, there are some population groups which show significantly worse health status than others. Statistically, these groups are Maori and Pacific peoples as well as low income New Zealanders.

Research indicates that Maori and Pacific peoples and low income New Zealanders do not access health services as often as their health status would justify; their lower utilisation of health care is considered to be caused by a range of barriers.

Although we know that in Partnership Health Canterbury at risk populations access general practice more often than the rest of the population, we cannot yet be sure that they are going on to access the services they are referred to such as the pharmaceuticals that are prescribed, laboratory tests, other diagnostic services, and hospital out-patient appointments.

This lower utilisation of primary health care services contributes to a higher utilisation of secondary care services (including hospitals).

PHOs are expected to collect information so that such groups can be identified, their needs understood and the barriers which stop them accessing primary health care removed or reduced.

Solutions to these problems must involve working with Maori and Pacific communities as well as other relevant communities and organisations.

How big is this problem in Canterbury?

We do not know how big the true problem is in Canterbury.

Although we know how often people access primary health care services, the question we are still seeking to answer is: Do they access them enough to meet their health needs? In a number of cases it is already clear they do not.

There are two main groups who fall into this category:

• Those who are not currently on any PHO register who are referred to as "the missing"
• The second grouping are those who do not access primary health care as frequently as their health status warrants, which we call "the missing out". This group of people is the main focus of our activity

What is Partnership Health Canterbury doing to improve the situation in Canterbury?

Partnership Health Canterbury has taken account of the best local, national and international experience in the broad "Services to Improve Access" field. This information has been woven into a co-ordinated, client-centred plan, designed specifically for Canterbury.

Partnership Health Canterbury is now funding an integrated set of services from this plan. These components aim to find the target population, reconnect them with primary health care services, get them any required primary health care and take steps to ensure they don't fall out of the primary health care system again.