Medicare Locals will be healthcare Polyfilla: Roxon
Divisions selected to be Medicare Locals must lose their doctor focus and prepare to be like Polyfilla to “fill in the gaps” of local health services, health minister Nicola Roxon says.
Speaking to the GP divisions’ annual conference in Melbourne today, the minister said the first priority of the new organisations will be to identify gaps in local services and integrate care.
“You are no longer organisations for a particular group of professionals – you are responsible for overseeing the primary health care needs of your entire community,” she told the AGPN’s GP Network Forum.
“You will need to work together to address these gaps – with an initial priority of addressing gaps in after hours services when you are first established.
Nicola Roxon said Medicare Locals will be tasked with supporting all health professionals in primary care, to “improve the quality and responsiveness of local care services, including in safety, performance and accountability”.
She said it was also important for Medicare Locals to go out into the local community and “tell and re-tell the story” of how they will improve local health services and how they will work with patients, professionals, other organisations, and hospitals.
The minister told the five divisions yet to be announced as Medicare Locals “not to be too disappointed” but to listen to the constructive feedback and “work cooperatively” with the Department of Health and Ageing
“Likewise, I would encourage applicants in areas where another organisation is to become the Medicare Local to contribute constructively to the process. The interests of the patients and providers in your area are best served by a smooth transition.”
It would seem that Nicola Roxon is making it quite clear that the dominance of the Division of General Practice is over when it comes to determining the delivery of clinical services provided in the jurisdiction of the new Medicare Locals. This is something about which the Board of the Southern Highlands Division of General Practice needs to take note. Recent declarations in the 'Highland's Doctor' by the Chairman of the SHDGP Board were:
"............. this was softened with the recognition that there was a real need to bring GPs from the Divisions into cooperation and participation as leaders in the new MLs, and that experience serving in Divisions over the previous 18 years had created skills in governance, service delivery and population health that few other potential ML Board members drawn from other branches of healthcare would have in the short term."
Drs Roche and Ruscoe had better reconsider their view in light of this recent advice from the Minister for Health and Ageing in which their role is to be collaborators and not as "leaders".
