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6.2: Urgent health needs

6.2: Responding to urgent health needs

Practice teams need to be skilled at responding to urgent health needs.. Some examples of clinical emergencies which can occur in a medical centre are chest pain, cardiac arrest, anaphylaxis, choking, acute asthma, or trauma.

Standard - what we'll be assessing on Evidence to provide for assessment

The practice team is skilled at responding to urgent health needs.
  • Current CPR training for all clinicians relevant to role. 
  • Annual clinical emergency drills allowing all team members to identify and respond to patients with urgent medical conditions in relation to their roles and responsibilities. 
  • Documented analysis and debrief of the annual clinical emergency drill scenarios.

Clinical emergencies

Some examples of clinical emergencies which can occur in a medical centre are chest pain, cardiac arrest, anaphylaxis, choking, acute asthma, or trauma. Managing these situations is stressful and thankfully relatively uncommon. Clinical scenario drills can help team members understand what their roles are and how to work together to manage the situation. This can be reassuring for team members and can help optimise the patient outcome in a real scenario.

Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) for clinical team members

CPR certification has become a complex subject with many CPR providers in existence and significant variations between them on course content, certificate duration and the title/names of the courses. One way of determining whether the CPR course undertaken is adequate for the clinician’s role, is to look at the content and duration of the CPR course.

For general practitioners the CPR course must be:

  • minimum of four hours
  • by an endorsed provider
  • reflective of the GPs work environment, for example, those working in a medically high-risk area need to consider doing an advanced certificate and rural hospital doctors have different requirements

Changes to ACLS requirement for GPs from June 1st 2025

All College members have been informed of changes to ACLS requirements, including their impact and implementation timeline.

A review conducted last year found that some courses, such as CORE Skills and refresher courses, did not meet best practice standards. To address this, a minimum six-hour contact time, time is the equivalent of the CORE immediate or above ACLS courses, which include an assessment, and will ensure all members receive training that is thorough and of a high standard.

To accommodate GP members with upcoming CORE Skills or refresher course bookings, the new requirement will take effect on 1 June 2025. Current resuscitation certificates remain valid until expiry, after which GP members must complete an approved CORE Immediate or higher course. Early completion is encouraged.

Updated ACLS endorsement criteria are available on the College website.

For nurses the CPR course must include:

  • infant, child and adult CPR, including mouth-to-mouth, mouth-to-mask and the management of choking
  • administration of intramuscular adrenaline for treatment of anaphylaxis
  • nurses and nurse practitioners working in a medically high-risk area need to consider doing an advanced certificate
  • all nurses with current authorised vaccinator certificates can be presumed to have the appropriate CPR certification.