NDRI, NDARC, NCETA and St Vincent’s Healthcare Australia were successful with their tender to establish a Centre of Clinical Excellence for Emerging Drugs of Concern. This targeted competitive tender was called by the Australian Government Department of Health on 6 October 2016 and submitted on 1 November for the establishment of the CoE that would, with a budget of up to some $8.8million over 4 years “include the role of innovation and technology in facilitating better access to treatment for clients in need, in particular for rural and remote populations; it will develop and identify appropriate resources to support treatment, training and evaluation; it may be connected to or based in an existing clinical entity (with all its corresponding clinical governance, research and ethics processes) and it may also include activities for remote clinical management such as online or interactive training”
The Directors of the four centres have been working on arrangements for the appointment of the CoE Director’s position and expect to make an appointment in the near future pending the formal announcement of the Centre’s funding by the Federal Government.