Alice Springs residents will have better access to health care, with the opening of a new Medicare Urgent Care Clinic (Medicare UCC).
The Alice Springs Medicare UCC, to be operated by the Central Australian Aboriginal Congress, will start seeing patients for urgent care needs from today, 4 December 2023.
The opening of this Medicare UCC delivers on the Albanese Government's commitment to make it easier for Territorians to get the urgent treatment they need - from highly qualified doctors and nurses - while taking pressure off local hospitals.
The clinic will be located at the Northside Shopping Complex, 1 Hearne Place, Alice Springs.
The Medicare UCC will be open seven days a week and offer walk-in care that is bulk billed.
Almost half of presentations to the Alice Springs emergency department in 2021-22 were for non-urgent or semi-urgent care.
Quotes attributable to Minister Butler:
"The Alice Springs Medicare UCC will make a big difference to local patients who will be able to walk in during extended hours and receive convenient, high-quality care from a nurse or a doctor.
"The clinic will ensure families in the Northern Territory who need urgent but not acute care, can get it quickly even if it's outside standard hours - and all they'll need is their Medicare card.
"This is just another way the Government is strengthening Medicare and making it easier to see a doctor."
Quotes attributable to Assistant Minister McCarthy:
"The Alice Springs (Mparntwe) Medicare UCC is going to make health care much more accessible and affordable for patients in the region.
"Congress has a proud history of providing exceptional medical care and it's exciting to see this new bulk-billed service open to the people of Alice Springs.
"Patients can walk in without an appointment, see a doctor or nurse and access imaging and pathology services.
"The clinic will ease pressure on the Alice Springs Hospital, so that so that their hard-working doctors and nurses can focus on higher priority emergencies."
Quotes attributable to Marion Scrymgour, Member for Lingiari:
"I've heard from people across Alice Springs how difficult it can be to access medical care when they have a pressing health concern, but they can't get in to see a GP.
"Most people in this situation end up in the emergency department, or, worse, they simply go without care.
"The Alice Springs Medicare UCC will ease pressure on our local emergency departments and be much more convenient for our community."
