We can’t digitally modernise health care while ignoring allied health professionals

Australia is charging ahead with digital health reforms, and not a moment too soon. The government is finally waking up to the fact that a modern health and aged care system cannot function with 1990s technology. But in its rush to modernise, one crucial group is being left behind: the allied health professionals.

Physiotherapists, dietitians, occupational therapists, speech pathologists and others form the backbone of much of the care delivered in hospitals, aged care, and community settings. Yet these professionals, many of them working in small businesses or regional areas, are still trapped in a paper-based world, without the tools or support to plug into the digital health system the rest of the sector is building.

The government’s draft National Allied Health Digital Uplift Plan is a welcome development. It recognises the yawning gap in digital capability across this vital part of the health workforce. But recognition is not enough. Good intentions do not wire up clinics or train staff. A strategy without investment is a fig leaf.

Digital infrastructure isn’t just a box to be ticked. It is the nervous system of modern care. Without it, information doesn’t flow, patient safety suffers, and the dream of coordinated, efficient care falls apart. That’s not ideology. It’s reality.

The Plan lists all the familiar challenges: poor IT systems, low digital literacy, and a profession that is fragmented and under-resourced. What it doesn’t yet offer is a credible path to fixing them. If we’re serious about system-wide reform, we need more than consultation papers. We need money on the table. Grants for small providers. Tailored training. Integration officers to help practices get online and stay online.

And crucially, we need to stop treating allied health like the poor cousin of the health system. These are not fringe players. In aged care, for example, allied health is central to mobility, nutrition, and communication: everything that gives older Australians dignity and independence. Yet many allied health practitioners in aged care aren’t even using clinical software. They’re sending faxes.

This isn’t just bad policy. It’s dangerous. And it speaks to a deeper reality: that digital health, for all the buzzwords, pilot projects, and glossy strategies, is too often left behind. And it’s not just allied health that’s struggling. We see the same gaps in hospitals, general practice, aged care and across the system. The promise of digital transformation keeps getting delayed, while the frontline is left to make do with outdated tools and disconnected systems.

Catholic Health Australia’s members, who operate hospitals, aged care homes, and community services, are seeing this digital divide up close. We’re working with health professionals every day who want to modernise, who want to connect, but are being held back by red tape, high costs, and clunky systems.

We don’t need more pilot projects or stakeholder roundtables. We need real investment. And we need it fast.

If the government is serious about integrated care, it must act now to lift all parts of the system into the digital age, not just in strategy documents, but in practice. That means investing in allied health, yes, but also addressing the digital gaps that persist across hospitals, general practice, and aged care. Because digital health isn’t ultimately about software or systems. It’s about people. And when we leave entire parts of the workforce behind, we’re not creating a connected system. We’re entrenching a fragmented one.

That’s not reform. It’s regression.

Read Catholic Health Australia’s submission on the National Allied Health Digital Uplift Plan here

This article first appeared in Health Services Daily