An Indigenous health clinic near Alice Springs has beeen able to operate more effectively and improve health care services for its community members by speeding up the delivery of test results after using Telstra’s BigPond service by satellite.

In the three years since David Evans has managed the Amoonguna medical clinic, the practice has grown, the patient list has expanded but so has the paperwork.

Previously the medical clinic manually processed Medicare claims and waited up to three months for payment. Incorrect claims were returned to the clinic to be resolved and then resubmitted. Pathology results and medical documents were sent and received by post, normally from interstate, taking a long time and requiring storage.

Amoonguna Medical Clinic can now receive the rapid online delivery of test results such as pathology, X-ray and ultrasound – for example, in the past blood results were sent to Adelaide to be processed and returned by snail mail; now patients can receive their results within a 48 hour turnaround as the clinic's computer receives electronic pathology downloads every fifteen minutes.

“Having broadband has made a big difference to our clinic. We can now do our Medicare bulk billing online which means we are paid within three weeks instead of three months and the system advises immediately if we input incorrect information,” Mr Evans said.

“I’m sure every busy medical clinic no matter where they are located suffers time management issues. The beauty of this package is that it saves time and reduces paperwork. It certainly works well for us.”