Health professionals

For Area Mental Health Services in Victoria

Spectrum is available to provide telephone-based secondary consultation services to clinicians working for Area Mental Health Services (AMHS) in Victoria. This secondary consultation service is designed to help you with general assessment, clinical formulation, risk assessment, and treatment planning.
We can also provide psychiatric second opinions for psychiatrists, in relation to clients being seen in an AMHS service.

To access this service, contact us on (03) 8413 8750.

For general practitioners, Medicare-participating nurse practitioners and private psychiatrists in Victoria

Spectrum’s Psychiatric Unit has a limited capacity to provide assessments and treatment advice to general practitioners, Medicare-participating nurse practitioners, and private psychiatrists in Victoria who are treating people with personality disorders.

Referrals to the Spectrum Psychiatric Unit can be via any of the following:

  • A referral by the AMHS, usually from the client’s case manager, for a psychiatric second opinion, Spectrum assessment and treatment, or for secondary consultation.
  • Any general practitioner in Victoria may refer a person suspected of having a personality disorder to the Spectrum consultant psychiatrist for an assessment. This referral does not usually result in a transfer to Spectrum treatment. However, it does provide diagnostic assessment and recommendations for treatment available within the public mental health sector, in addition to private psychologists, private psychiatrists, allied health clinicians, and nurse practitioners. These assessments are carried out in the Spectrum Assessment Clinic which bulk bills under Medicare.
  • Any private psychiatrist may request a second opinion by a Spectrum consultant psychiatrist (via the Spectrum Medicare clinic), by writing a referral letter addressed to the Spectrum consultant psychiatrist.
  • A referral to the Spectrum 10-Week Intensive Group Treatment Program can be made by a general practitioner within the Primary Health Care Network.

Outpatient treatment clinics

Complex care services

Clinical experience placements

Referral process and forms

Secondary consultation

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