A national committee has been established by the Australian Digital Health Agency to strengthen clinical oversight of digital health.

The National Clinical Governance Committee for Digital Health (NCGC-DH) will guide Australia’s approach to emerging technologies, such as virtual care and artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare.

Australian Digital Health Agency CEO Amanda Cattermole said the development of the NCGC- DH marks a significant milestone in guiding the safety, quality, and continuous improvement of digital health in Australia.

“By bringing together leading voices from across the health sector, we are prioritising that the future of digital health is clinically safe, effective, and centred on the needs of all Australians,” Ms Cattermole said.

“This committee will play a pivotal role in providing advice to government, shaping policy and practices as digital health technology evolves.”

NCGC-DH Chair Dr Amandeep Hansra highlighted the committee’s diversity of membership.

“Expert Advisory Groups reporting to the NCGC-DH are central to its work. These groups will include clinicians, consumers, industry, health technology experts, and other relevant government agencies, including the Therapeutic Goods Administration and Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care.”

The NCGC-DH Expert Advisory Groups will focus on three key areas: Better and faster access to safe health information sharing; advising on patient safety and quality issues in virtual care and telehealth; and advising on the safe implementation of AI in healthcare settings.

by contrast, serves as a symbol of progress: diagnosed early, treated consistently, he lived independently to the age of 102.

(Continued from previous page)

And so, in 2001, working from a table in Dr Beaumont’s storage area with no funding and no roadmap, the Macular Degeneration Foundation, later to become Macular Disease Foundation Australia, was born. “We didn’t let people know we were small,” Dr Beaumont noted. “We spoke with a loud voice.”

Describing Ms Buttrose as “awesome” he said, “Ita always speaks with clarity and compassion. We owe Ita an enormous depth of gratitude.”

Ms Buttrose’s reply was characteristically gracious and poignant. She spoke fondly of her Uncle Gerald, who was “engaged with the world, still reading, still recognising faces, still living fully”, before passing away at 102 while listening to opera.

POLICY BATTLES AND PIONEERING VICTORIES Over the following years, MDFA pursued government access with persistence. Dr Beaumont described sitting in meetings with federal ministers who had never heard of – let alone could pronounce – the condition, and others who told him bluntly they had “bigger priorities”. Despite this, alongside patients, the Foundation lobbied relentlessly for recognition and for access to emerging treatments.

“His life and the quality of those later years was not an accident,” Ms Buttrose told Dr Beaumont. “It was the result of progress. Progress that you, Paul, helped make possible.”

Ms Buttrose praised Dr Beaumont’s refusal to accept blindness as inevitable and his insistence on asking the question of why. “You have helped bring macular disease out of the shadows and into the national conversation,” she said. “You have challenged government, changed policy, and most importantly, changed outcomes for thousands of Australians.”

The arrival of photodynamic therapy and, later, sight-saving anti-VEGF injections provided the impetus for even more intense advocacy. Dr Beaumont recounted presenting unpublished clinical data to the Department of Health, making the case that Australia needed to act with expedience. The result was historic: Australia became the first country in the world to subsidise anti-VEGF treatment without restriction, preserving the sight of thousands of Australians.

THE ROAD AHEAD Despite remarkable progress – awareness of macular disease has risen from under 2% to approximately 90% of Australians. MDFA has committed nearly AU$7 million to research, which Dr Beaumont said made it the largest non- government funder of macular disease research in the country. But he was resolute in stating that the work was far from finished.

Dr Beaumont said this achievement, and others are the “sorts of things you cannot do unless you’ve got a foundation”.

NORMA’S STORY: WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT Among the most moving passages of Dr Beaumont’s oration was the story of his patient Norma Tory – a woman who, at 100 years old, celebrated her birthday in his clinic with champagne before her injection. When Ms Tory became too immobile to attend appointments, Dr Beaumont refused to let her sight deteriorate. Inspired, he said, by the ghost of Fred Hollows, he continued treating her at her care facility until she was 104.

“Macular disease remains the leading cause of blindness in Australia,” he said. “We will never be finished. Not until there’s a cure and no one faces vision loss alone.”

And Dr Chapman reiterated the Foundation’s commitment to find a cure. Thanking the audience for their ongoing support she said the goal had been set to raise AU$1 million this year alone, and $3 million per year by 2030, all of which will contribute to this ongoing quest.

“She read two books a week,” Dr Beaumont said. “She watched television. She recognised the faces of her family. Norma stopped reading not because she went blind, but because a couple of weeks before the end, she couldn’t hold the book.” As in those early days of the Foundation’s existence, his voice was loud and clear: “This story about Norma is what it’s all about. She not only lived longer, she lived better – with dignity, and curiosity, and light.”

TRIBUTE TO A PATRON Central to the oration was Dr Beaumont’s tribute to Ms Buttrose, whom he described as bringing “stature to the cause” from the moment she accepted the role of patron without hesitation. Ms Buttrose’s connection to macular disease, Dr Beaumont noted, is deeply personal – she watched her father, Charles, lose his ability to read and recognise faces at a time when no effective treatment existed. Her Uncle Gerald,