Abstract
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Rural Australians have poor access to health care services, increasing the incidences of
disease and mortality. Technology may be a means to improve this accessibility by reducing
the amount of time dietitians spend collecting diet histories. A web-based program,
DietAdvice, can increase the amount of time spent with patients on education and
counselling. The aim of this study was to investigate the benefits of a program such as
DietAdvice on the accessibility of dietetic services and to describe the potential impacts of
DietAdvice for dietitians working in both rural and urban settings. Results from an earlier,
evaluation phase of the DietAdvice website, were used to develop a questionnaire. The
questionnaire was pilot tested and comprised of 26 open and closed questions. Forty-one
dietitians were recruited to complete the questionnaire. Twenty-three (56%) dietitians
responded of which 61% worked outside of metropolitan Sydney and 61% had a waiting list
ranging from over one week to four months. Staff shortage and travel time were reported to
be the main reasons for long waiting lists. Sixty-one percent of dietitians take 10-20 minutes
diet history interviews, while 22% take longer than 20 minutes. Seventy-eight percent of
respondents believed DietAdvice could be beneficial in private practice, with 30% believing
it could be useful in community practice and hospitals. NSW dietitians seeing 20 patients per
week could spend 200-400 minutes collecting data for diet histories, time which could