TWEET OF THE WEEK“ It’ s the patient’ s Medicare rebate. Not the doctor’ s.”
— Dr Bastian Seidel, RACGP president @ DrBastianSeidel
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Who’ s liable?
( NSW looks set to ditch mandatory reporting of colleagues, 27 April) It will be interesting to see how they word the legislation changes. The NSW Government isn’ t going to be volunteering to take responsibility for any adverse effects on patients as a result of this. Will the onus reside with the treating doctor, or with the affected doctor? Obviously there are times when a notification will be necessary to protect the public. Where will the liability reside?
Karina
What about some older specialists who are underperforming? For example, a cardiologist, orthopod or nephrologist who simply sees patients and writes rmedical reports, but does no procedures and also falls behind with knowledge of recent medications? But who still draws specialist fees, and does unnecessary and irrelevant ECGs, X-rays or blood tests on all consultations. In other words, they should be retired, as they are only working now to support their other interests such as farms, wineries,
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etc. I know one or two, and often their reports are wrong, but unfortunately accepted by courts and insurance companies to the detriment of patients’ wellbeing.
Hypocrites GP
Vaping safely
( Lowdown on e-cigarettes, 21 April) Thank you, Professor Colin Mendelsohn, for pragmatic and extremely useful advice to assist us in helping our nicotine-addicted patients. The NHMRC and TGA should be more concerned about regulating useless complementary medications rather than e-cigarettes and get on board.
Rick Hambour
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Train the patients
( Medicare freeze looks set to stay another year, 24 April) The choices are either to see more patients in an everdecreasing amount of time, or charge a fee. But the market is about to be flooded with doctors. Some years back we were graduating about 500 per year and now the number is more like 1500. So there won’ t just be a bulk-billing clinic nearby; there will be one on each side of your clinic and another across the road. All these doctors are going to cost the government a lot of money over the years. Meanwhile, in order to survive, either find a niche where you can charge gaps, or train the patients that
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it is now‘ one problem per consult’.
James Moxham Whether the freeze ends or not, general practice still dies— it’ s just a matter of time. Rather than fight for meagre increases, we should be pushing to change the system to make it more convenient. A smaller upfront payment and rebate to the doctor.
Harry Nespolon
Divided we fall
( Divided college ploughs ahead with constitution vote, 28 April) The RACGP sets the‘ minimum requirements’ for GPs to keep up with their professional knowledge. It has used this power to include the QI & CPD annual, mandatory fee. The fee is currently around $ 700, and you’ ve got to pay that whether you are a member or not. With such guaranteed income every year, the college does not need to value GPs’ opinions at all, whether from members or non-members. I’ m afraid the new board will be tempted to add further tax-like‘ minimum requirements’ to the current list.
Mehdi Zahedpur This is why I resigned from the college.
Michael Serafim
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