Sparked Bright Sparks: Adrian Gilliland

We spoke to Adrian about his involvement in the Sparked Community, here’s what he had to say!

❓What is your background?

I am a GP and joint practice owner of a large GP-owned practice in Coffs Harbour, NSW. I am also a Director and Chair of Healthy North Coast PHN for the past 4 years. Previously I have been involved in a number of Health IT connectivity projects including Admission and Discharge Notifications, the first Healthlink e-referrals project in Wellington New Zealand and the current Chair of the NSW Single Digital Patient Record GP Working Group.

❓ How did you first hear about Sparked and what made you want to become involved?

I was advised of an invitation to join this group from the national PHN Cooperative and with my passion for improved communication and integration between the Primary Care and hospital sectors and a coming together of Government, Industry, Clinicians and IT experts which is rarely seen, I could see great opportunity for improved communication and connectivity.

❓ What do you see as the best outcomes that Sparked has delivered or is working towards?

The creation of real standards for common communication between different parts of the health system that are actually being used and supported by government, industry and led by clinicians who are the end users. 

❓ How is Sparked different to projects you’ve been involved in before?

Produce real world outputs that are useful to clinicians and are open to and respond to feedback from all parts of the community rather than a talkfest followed by closed door decision making.

❓ What is something you’ve learnt from being part of the Sparked community?

A different way of working that is fast, inclusive and focussed on problem solving listening to the complaints of real users but actually producing outputs in a stepped and inclusive way, building on previous work in clear improvement cycles. 

❓ Can you share one of your favourite or memorable moments from participating in Sparked?

Hearing about the International Patient Summary and the ability of pilgrims on the Haj from Malaysia and Indonesia being able to share their health information if they became ill on the journey and how we can use this transformative technology in Australia. 

❓ What excites you most about the future with Sparked?

The ability to be able to share and retrieve crucial health information to make the right decisions with my patients working as a GP rather than spending wasted time chasing this information or making suboptimal choices due the information not being available.

❓ What’s something unexpected that you’ve learnt/been a part of/connected with through Sparked?

That industry actually want common standards as it makes their job easier rather than a perception by some clinicians that they want to work in walled gardens to monetise health information.

❓ How would you explain Sparked to someone not yet involved?

Building a common language so that different IT systems can talk to each other and share information rather than converting information into static text documents such as pdfs.

❓ What piece of advice would you share to someone who may not yet be a part of Sparked?

Great community that is making a difference, is inclusive, fun and actually gets stuff done.

❓ If you had to describe Sparked in three words, what would they be?

Friendly, Inclusive Do-ers (Gets stuff done)

❓ If Sparked had a theme song, what would it be?

I’ve Got a Feeling- Black Eyed Peas

❓ Describe Sparked using only emojis

🤓 🔥 🙌 🏄💻🧑‍⚕️🏥