Historically it has proved difficult to increase the percentage of OST clients receiving care in primary health care settings. The aim of this project was to ensure OST clients receive their care in the most appropriate setting for them, whether it be primary health care, or a secondary service.
ESR's social system scientists undertook analysis of interviews with OST practitioners, clients and pharmacies. They also developed desirable and feasible models that would support an increase in primary care provision of OST and convened and facilitated workshops of key stakeholders to critique and refine the models. The team provided support to the DHB in designing a pilot implementation of the preferred model and designed a monitoring framework to extract and analyse learnings from the pilot.