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Christmas wish list for general practice

Dr Tony Bartone,
vicdoc December 2009

As the year draws to a close, GP Section Chair Tony Bartone outlines his Christmas wish list for general practice in 2010.

It’s Christmas time again and the advertisers will be reminding us to buy gifts. It is a time-honoured tradition in our family to compile a wish list and then hope that some one takes note of it and decides that you have been ‘good enough’ to warrant a treat. In this tradition I have compiled my wish list for general practice. No doubt yours will be different to mine but I am prepared to bet there is some overlap.

We have already been fortunate with some early ‘gifts’. I refer to the recent news that midwives and independent nurse practitioners will have to work collaboratively with a GP.

My list includes:

  • General practices being encouraged to employ more practice nurses through specific grants and further access to MBS items.
  • Patients in residential aged care facilities having access to MBS rebates for practice nurse consultations on behalf of a general practitioner.
  • General practitioners as team care coordinators being allowed to refer all patients for some allied health visits covered by the MBS per annum.
  • All general practice being able to communicate effectively with hospitals and aged care facilities as well as an IT interface between general practice and other community health care providers, such as allied health and pharmacy.
  • The proposed $300 million for infrastructure for Comprehensive Primary Health Care Centres being split into new practice and existing practice infrastructure grants to promote access to team-based care and training (with additional rooms for teaching and allied health).
    • training and supporting of additional nurses to be used by general practices especially in areas of need, or revamping the Medicare Benefits Schedule with a seven tier system and rewarding GPs for spending more time with patients with chronic health conditions.
    • Redirecting current funding arrangements for divisions either to:

Oh! Just for the record and in the same spirit of no more ties, socks or Andrea Bocelli CDs, there are some things I don’t want to see in the New Year. A non-exhaustive list would have to include items such as:

  • No pay-for-performance incentives
  • No fund-holding
  • No more 300-page-plus reports

I hope that GPs have been ‘good enough’ in the eyes of the various decision makers this year. AMA Victoria Section of General Practice will continue to ensure that the various GP issues remain front and centre in the Health debate because there can be no denying Australian general practice is more than just good enough… it is a world leader. Now more than ever it needs more resources and assistance rather than threats and punitive measures.

I wish you all a happy and safe festive season. I hope you are able to get some much needed rest before what promises to be a very challenging year ahead in general practice ……an election year!

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