Miss Rebekah Deighton1, Mrs Marea Webb2
1Office of the Chief Allied Health Officer, Queensland Health, Herston, Australia, 2Division of Mental Health Alcohol and Other Drugs, Darling Downs Hospital and Health Service, Toowoomba, Australia
Biography:
Rebekah Deighton is the Allied Health Director Mental Health, Alcohol, and Other Drugs at the Office of the Chief Allied Health Officer, Queensland Health. With a robust background in mental health, Rebekah has dedicated her career to improving allied health and mental health services, particularly in regional Queensland.
Marea Webb is the Director Allied Health Mental Health at Darling Downs Hospital and Health Service, Toowoomba. Marea has been an Occupational Therapist for over 35 years, and has had experience in a variety of clinical, project and management positions in mental health and general health, inpatient and community settings.
Abstract:
Background:
Supporting allied health new graduates as they commence their career in public mental health alcohol and other drugs services (MHAODS) is essential to ensure that they develop their profession specific skills to provide high quality, safe practice, and to develop the allied health workforce pipeline.
Methods:
Across Queensland Health, there was inconsistent supports being provided to new graduates. Based on finding from broad workforce consultation and feedback from pilot sites a statewide new graduate program framework has been developed. The new graduate program aims to provide allied health graduates with a positive transition to practice combining rotational clinical experience, supervision, peer reflection, training and education opportunities.
Discussion:
The presentation will describe the key features of the program and the implementation strategies used by a regional service to support the graduate’s successful completion of the program. This will include highlighting core skill capability development opportunities and the role of the monthly virtual peer reflection and learning session which was an opportunity for graduates to connect, share their learnings and support their peers at the same stage of their career.