Employee Assistance Program

TELUS Health can provide support and resources to help you find answers to questions related to work, life, health, family, or money. You can contact TELUS Health for support with any issue, challenge, or concern. Consultants are available 24/7.

Yes, EAP services are confidential. This means that information shared with an EAP counsellor or provider is kept confidential and is not shared with the Guild or anyone else without the employee's consent, except in certain situations, such as when there is a risk of harm to oneself or others.

The Guild’s EAP through TELUS Health is available to all employees of Guild member pharmacies, as well as immediate family members/dependents.

Employees can access EAP services by the dedicated helpline, In-app calling, instant messaging and email.

Register your pharmacy

Yes, EAP services are provided at no cost to the employee or their family members. The Pharmacy Guild of Australia pays for the services as part of their employee benefits package.

Short-term counselling is not clinically appropriate in all situations. The TELUS Health approach looks at the intensity and duration of support required to determine if short-term counselling is the most clinically appropriate fit.

This may include seeking longer-term support from external services for more complex issues. TELUS Health clinicians have access to trusted networks of private and community resources for referral to additional support, and this is undertaken in consultation with the individual to tailor the most suitable next steps.

TELUS Health provides a number of case management activities to support clients to achieve their goals, including:

• Finding a GP or long-term clinician in the community
• Referral and providing handover to other services
• Monitoring progress between sessions.

Yes, you can use EAP services for a variety of reasons, including to get help with stress management, improve work-life balance, or receive coaching or guidance on personal or professional goals.

All calls are answered out of the Melbourne call centre and callers will be asked a couple of identifying questions such as:

• Organisation – The Pharmacy Guild of Australia or PGA
• Some personal contact details
• Job Title – Pharmacist or Pharmacy Assistant

As part of the Guild’s program employees have access to 3 sessions per presenting issue, per year.

In the event that your concern is ongoing in nature, your counsellor will discuss with you the appropriateness of a referral to a community resource outside the EAP and will work with you to access this long-term support.

As EAP is a short term and solution focused program it is best practice for you to continue with your existing care plan with your existing provider. That said, TELUS Health are available to support should you not be able to reach your regular provider.

The Guild’s EAP subscription does not include Critical Incident Support, but when you sign up to the EAP you have immediate access to this service as an add-on payable extra via LifeWorks should you require it. Your service will be invoiced directly from LifeWorks on a case-by-case basis, should you request this level of service.

LifeWorks uses a team of specialist clinicians with trauma response experience to provide appropriate and highly responsive critical incident support, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

Their specialised Critical Incident Disaster Response support clinicians provide immediate guidance regarding the likely effects of a traumatic event, they will agree on an intervention plan, including clinically appropriate response times.

The LifeWorks team will also recommend the most appropriate intervention for your circumstances and will dispatch local clinicians to conduct onsite interventions.