STIs Essentials for Primary Care

This informative and interactive session will provide you with the understanding and tools required to confidently manage common STI screening and care, making sexual health a routine everyday part of your primary health care practice.

Over the last 10 years syphilis, chlamydia and gonorrhoea rates have all increased in Victoria, and primary health care practitioners are the key to bringing these epidemics under control. Sexually transmissible infections (STIs) may not be visible but can cause severe health problems if left undiagnosed and untreated. This informative and interactive session will provide you with the understanding and tools required to confidently manage common STI screening and care, making sexual health a routine everyday part of your primary health care practice. The option of referring complex cases and receiving other supports from the new sexual health sentinel clinics in Hillside and Tarneit will be highlighted.

Presenter & Facilitator:
Dr Melanie Bissessor, Sexual Health Physician - Melbourne Sexual Health Centre

Learning Methods:
Presentation, Case Discussion, Q&A.

Continuing Professional Development:
4 x RACGP CPD Activity / 2 x ACRRM PDP points. All participants will receive a certificate of attendance.

Learning outcomes:

• Improve understanding of sexual health care for young people, pregnant women and other key populations;
• How to approach taking a sexual history;
• Describe the clinical presentation of chlamydia, gonorrhoea, syphilis;
• Correctly perform comprehensive sexual health screening, including testing for the most common STIs - chlamydia, gonorrhoea, syphilis;
• Manage treatment, contact tracing and if necessary, referrals using the Health Pathways tool.