What is HealthPathways?
HealthPathways is an online information portal that supports health professionals with clinical and local referral information at the point of consultation.
HealthPathways allows healthcare professionals to enter the patient’s condition or suspected illness, access symptom outlines and management options and access information on how to refer patients to the most appropriate local services and specialists.
HealthPathways is primarily designed for general practice teams, but is also available to allied health professionals, specialists and other health professionals. HealthPathways is tailored to each local region providing locally relevant and practical pathways of care. Developed collaboratively by GPs, hospital clinicians and other health professionals, it reflects strong cross-sector collaboration and continues to adapt to local needs, supporting clinicians to provide timely referral options and evidence-based care.
HealthPathways was originally developed in New Zealand in 2008 as a collaboration between Streamliners and the Canterbury District Health Board. Since then, it has expanded to over 40 regions across Australia, New Zealand and the UK with each region having between 600-900 localised pathways, contributing to significant improvements in the way general practice and hospitals share the care of patients.
What are the Benefits?
Benefits for primary care
HealthPathways is designed to be efficient, simple and easy to use. From a single website, GPs and other health professionals can identify the most effective treatment and management options using locally developed clinical guidelines and quickly determine the relevant local specialists and services for their patients from an up-to-date service directory. As pathways are developed collaboratively by GPs, hospital clinicians and other health professionals, HealthPathways fosters improved communication and teamwork between primary care and hospital-based specialists and promotes standardised care, ensuring consistent patient management.
It also serves as a practical educational resource for GP registrars, nurses and junior doctors. Time spent in the system can be tracked for continuing professional development reporting.
Benefits for patients
HealthPathways is designed to improve the outcomes and experiences of patients by ensuring they receive the right treatment with shorter waiting times. HealthPathways helps by providing GPs and other health professionals:
- the best management and treatment options locally available for common medical conditions
- information on how to refer to the most appropriate local services and specialists
- educational resources and information for patients, to enable better self-management
Who manages HealthPathways?
In our region, HealthPathways is a partnership between our PHN and the Nepean Blue Mountains Local Health District. We collaborate with general practice clinical staff, hospital and community specialists, nurses and allied health providers to create locally relevant pathways.
Setting up your Individual Account?
- Visit HealthPathways
- Click the Sign in or register button
- Click Register
- Enter your personal information and email address (this cannot be a shared practice email)
- Complete your registration, including:
– name of your primary practice
– postcode of your primary practice
– professional registration number and registering body
– a password minimum of 8 characters - You will receive an email once your registration has been approved
- Log into HealthPathways using your new individual account
Video – Registering for HealthPathways for the first time
Improved Privacy and Security
Your individual account will provide a private and secure login, allowing you to manage your own details, including password updates. Only anonymised and aggregated usage data is collected to support quality improvements. To learn more, visit Terms of Use and Privacy on HealthPathways.
Reporting CPD Hours
Individualised accounts now makes it possible to log continuing professional development (CPD) hours. Time spent in the system is automatically recorded and you can add reflections to track your professional development. Reports can be personalised with self-directed learning notes, making it simple to generate activity reports.
Links and Resources
Browse the links and resources below to learn more about HealthPathways.
Videos
- Adding a HealthPathways shortcut to your desktop
- Requesting access to HealthPathways sites in other regions
- New feature CPD hours
- New feature AI search post
