The Health Professions Licensing Authority (HPLA) is a branch of the Department of Health. The branch is established to provide the administrative and operational support necessary to facilitate the various Health Professional Boards to perform their functions.
The five Territory hospitals provide general services ranging from primary screening and prevention to acute and chronic care. But with issues such as remoteness, a scattered population and the absence of alternative health care providers, hospitals in the Northern Territory also provide a series of non-acute services to their communities.
VRE stands for Vancomycin Resistant Enterococcus. The Enterococcus is a bacterium (germ) that everyone has in their bowel. Vancomycin is one of the antibiotics used to treat infections caused by the Enterococcus germ. Sometimes this germ develops resistance to Vancomycin. When this occurs, the infection can no longer be treated by Vancomycin.