Office of Rural and Remote Health

The Office of Rural and Remote Health (ORRH) was established to provide a strong voice in the development of statewide policy, strategy and planning, and to foster stronger and more resilient health care in Queensland’s rural and remote communities.

With its main office in Townsville, the ORRH also has staff in Brisbane, Cairns, Emerald and Proserpine. ORRH provides a centralised and coordinated hub to respond to system-wide healthcare challenges through strategy and governance, as well as providing practical support to smaller health services through clinical support. In February 2022, the Director-General launched the Rural and Remote Health and Wellbeing Strategy 2022- 2027, which guides ORRH projects.

Modified Monash Model

The ORRH remit is to advocate for MM 4-7 facilities. The Modified Monash Model (MMM) is an Australian Government metric to define whether a location is a city, rural, remote or very remote. The model measures remoteness and population size on a scale of Modified Monash (MM) category MM 1 to MM 7. MM 1 is a major city and MM 7 is very remote.

You can learn more about the MMM here or access a map here (select the MMM 2019 checkbox and use QLD as the location).