Clinical Advice & Guidance™
Secure, bi-directional communication between healthcare providers, enabling timely specialist advice and coordinated patient care.
What is Advice & Guidance™?
Consultmed’s Advice & Guidance™ (A&G) platform is a secure messaging solution that enables primary care providers to seek rapid clinical advice from specialists by sending structured clinical queries through a single, integrated channel. Instead of referring patients directly to outpatient clinics, GPs and other providers can use the platform to receive specialist Advice and Guidance, often within days.
Advice & Guidance™ models have been adopted worldwide and are sometimes called ‘eConsult’, ‘eConsultation’ or ‘Secondary Consult’. Evidence demonstrates that A&G models of care improve access to specialist care, reduce pressure on outpatient clinics, and enhance patient and provider satisfaction.
Why are health systems increasingly adopting Advice & Guidance™?
- Rapid access to specialist care
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Advice & Guidance™ supports timely access to hospital specialists without the need for face-to-face appointments. Across published programs, the average response time is between one and two days, giving GPs and other primary care providers faster access to expert input.
- Manage outpatient demand and wait times
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Clinical Advice & Guidance™ programs have demonstrated measurable reductions in outpatient demand including 30% reduction in unnecessary and inappropriate hospital and outpatient presentations, along with significant decreases in wait times for first specialist appointments. By resolving suitable cases digitally, services can focus clinic capacity on patients who truly require in-person care.
- Connected care
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Advice & Guidance™ creates a secure digital connection between primary and specialist care, improving communication, reducing duplication, and supporting shared decision-making. Programs have also shown that A&G enhances knowledge and clinical decision-making for primary care providers beyond the individual case, supporting ongoing learning in practice.
- Data insights and business intelligence
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Implementing Advice & Guidance™ provides real-time visibility of request volumes, response times, and clinical outcomes. These insights support smarter resourcing, service planning, and continuous improvement across hospitals and health networks.
Intelligent virtual triage
Advice & Guidance™ supports healthcare providers to triage patients digitally using customisable referral access criteria and data-driven insights. Specialists can review requests, assess patient needs, and prioritise care according to urgency.
By enabling smarter triage, the platform helps hospitals and specialist clinics manage demand more effectively, ensuring that patients are directed to the most appropriate care pathway and those with the greatest need are seen first.
Share imaging and diagnostics
Consultmed’s Advice & Guidance™ platform makes it simple to share the right clinical context with every request. Healthcare providers can securely upload diagnostic reports and clinical images for specialist review. The platform supports all common imaging and file types.
Attachments can also be added directly from GP, allied health and specialist practice management systems, reducing duplication and saving time by pulling files straight from the clinical record. QR scanning technology allows pictures and documents to be uploaded directly using a smart phone, with files sent securely to the platform without being stored on the device.
Strengthening multidisciplinary care with case conferencing
Consultmed’s Advice & Guidance™ platform embeds Case Conferencing directly into the referral workflow, making multidisciplinary collaboration simple and secure.
With a single click, services can start a Case Conference, notify the referrer, and invite specialists, allied health providers, nurses, and GPs into one shared thread. All discussions are securely captured, time-stamped, and exportable as a PDF, while outcomes flow back into GP and specialist practice management systems.
This enables active collaboration, less duplication, and better coordinated care for patients.
Closing the feedback loop
Advice & Guidance™ builds trust by capturing secure feedback from both providers and patients.
- Provider feedback: captures how access to specialist A&G influenced care and whether referrals and outpatient visits were avoided
- Patient feedback: Patients and carers can share their experience easily, via secure SMS or email surveys, providing services with valuable insights into care pathways
This two-way feedback creates a powerful cycle of continuous improvement, driving better experiences and outcomes for patients and providers alike.
Bring Advice & Guidance™ to your service
Contact us to learn more about our work with hospitals and health services to make specialist advice accessible to primary care providers, reduce pressure on clinics, and improve care for patients.