The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Radiologists (RANZCR) is urging all political parties to commit to four key priorities ahead of the 2025 Australian federal election, aimed at improving equitable patient access to vital diagnostic, interventional, and cancer care medical imaging.
Quality diagnostic imaging, interventional radiology, and radiation oncology are indispensable to Australia’s health care system, however many Australians continue to experience significant barriers in accessing these essential services.
RANZCR asserts that the following priority areas require government action to reduce the inequities that continue to disproportionately disadvantage people living in regional, rural,l and remote locations and which negatively impact women’s access to critical cancer treatment.
The College also contends that more can be done to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the sector, by increasing regulator accountability and ensuring that patients receive the ‘right test at the right time’.
The four election priorities are as follows.
- Build a sustainable rural/regional medical imaging health workforce to address the shortage of medical imaging specialists in underserved regional and rural areas by establishing and funding a permanent, standalone regional and rural training pathway to attract, train,n and retain a medical imaging specialty workforce outside metropolitan areas.
- Increase regulator accountability, effectiveness, and efficiency by introducing a formal system of regular independent reviews that will facilitate greater oversight and accountability of regulatory bodies which will in turn result in greater efficiency and effectiveness of regulation.
- Improve women’s cancer care, particularly for those living in regional and rural locations, to access brachytherapy, a life-saving treatment particularly for gynecological cancers, by reinstating the Radiation Oncology Health Grants (ROHPG) scheme to support capital costs and expanding funding for additional Advanced Training Fellowships in delivering brachytherapy.
- Support appropriate medical imaging and address the increasing demand for and cost of diagnostic imaging services by embedding Electronic Clinical Decision Support (eCDS) within the Australian health system to ensure that the most appropriate imaging test is conducted at the right time.
For more information about RANZCR’s election priorities, please visit RANZCR’s Australian Election Priorities 2025.
