Background: The Beat the Heat: don't forget your drink program was initiated to enable the general public to recognise and manage heat stress. It was accompanied by a telephone survey to assess program reach and knowledge and behaviours of the general public in managing heat stress. Methods: The program was implemented in the Riverina‐Murray region of New South Wales, in the summer of 2008/09, through radio and television sound bytes, newspaper announcements, distribution of posters and brochures, and public talks. Computer Assisted Telephone Interviews were conducted with 328 randomly selected participants from across the region. Results: Sixty‐three per cent of participants reported hearing heat health warnings and 53% changed their heat management strategies, although only 25% recalled the program slogan. On average, participants self‐rated their understanding of managing heat health at 7.9 on a 10 point scale. More than 75% of participants said they would recognise the symptoms of heat stress. Most reported exposure to heat and health information from television, radio and newspapers rather than from posters, brochures and talks. Those at greatest risk included people who worked or exercised outdoors, men and those taking medication. Conclusions: Television, radio and newspapers were successful media for the program. Knowledge and responses of the general public to heat risks were well developed, with several exceptions – people taking medications, or working or playing sports outdoors, as well as tourists and men. These exceptions should be targeted in future programs.

The low proportion of tests performed to presentations (in conjunction with the high proportion of notifications to tests performed) reflects that chlamydia testing among providers is still being undertaken in a targeted approach rather than from a population-focused screening perspective. Further work with GPs is required to improve chlamydia screening rates, and ensure practice is consistent with national guidelines.

The vaccination of children who have not been vaccinated in a timely manner has long been a concern for health professionals. These hard-to-reach children may come from myriad backgrounds and are not vaccinated for a range of reasons.1 Strategies need to be implemented to vaccinate this group.A study of the immunisation status of children aged less than seven years presenting to Wagga Wagga Base Hospital emergency department (ED) was conducted for presentations in July and December 2004 to identify if the immunisation rates of children presenting to the ED were an over-representation of unimmunised children when compared with the immunisation rate in the local community. Children presenting to the ED and those subsequently admitted to the children's ward would be a captive group to target for immunisation if needed.Children were grouped as being due for vaccination when they were due by age and were not more than four weeks past their due date. Children were grouped as overdue for vaccination when they were four or more weeks past the due date for one or more of their vaccinations.July and December had 425 and 384 presentations to the ED respectively. Duplicate presentations were removed, resulting in a total of 705 individual children presenting. Figure 1 shows the percentage of children who were either due or overdue for vaccination and if they had been subsequently vaccinated.Ninety-three children (13.2%) who presented to the ED were either due or overdue for vaccination. Fifty-six of these children went on to be vaccinated after their ED presentation.Of a total of 122 children who presented to the ED and were admitted to a hospital ward, 18 were due or overdue for vaccination. Of these, three were vaccinated at the hospital and nine have been vaccinated since hospital, leaving six admitted children not vaccinated post discharge.