ATLAS Indigenous primary care surveillance and research network

The ATLAS Indigenous Primary Care Surveillance and Research Network was established in 2017 to better explain the longstanding disparity in sexually transmissible infections (STIs) and blood-borne viruses (BBVs) among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

ATLAS was developed in partnership with the Aboriginal Community-Controlled Health Organisation (ACCHO) sector in five clinical hubs, spanning the Kimberley in Western Australia, Cape York in Queensland, urban Brisbane, New South Wales and South Australia. There are currently more than 80 Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Service sites and Indigenous communities nationally that are partners in the collaboration.

ATLAS was designed to address difficulties in obtaining aggregated service level data allowing services to contextualise notification data provided at a state/territory and national level with local STI and BBV testing, positivity and treatment information.  This also provides services with increased capacity to monitor continuous quality improvement initiatives specific to STI and BBV prevention and control.

The ATLAS network links deidentified clinical data within participating sites and returns service-specific reports and access to dashboard analyses describing STI and BBV screening, positivity, treatment completion and outcomes to ACCHOs on a regular basis.

We are currently working to increase the number of participating ACCHOs, link with other primary care providers and add new regions to the ATLAS network. We are also expanding the scope of the data infrastructure, to include vaccine-preventable and other infectious diseases.
The ATLAS network supports the capacity of ACCHOs to provide high quality, evidence-based, best practice clinical care for improved health outcomes for Indigenous peoples.

Activity to expand ATLAS and develop programs that transform clinical outcomes, while strengthening Indigenous governance and research capacity, will exponentially increase the utility and sustainability of Australia’s only comprehensive Indigenous primary care surveillance network.