GP Divisions' Dodgy Deal With New Zealand Puts ADGP Under a (Long White) Cloud

Dr Haikerwal said a media release from the ADGP yesterday [Cross-Tasman talks on quality prescribing, ADGP, 8/09/04 confirms rumours of an ADGP Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with NZ that were picked up by an AMA delegation to New Zealand last week.

"The ADGP is selling out Australian GPs and their patients with this dodgy deal," Dr Haikerwal said.

"Our visit to New Zealand last week confirmed what we already know - their health system is characterised by ineffective regulation and fundholding.

"We don't need this system in Australia - ours is more robust.

"This deal is all about fundholding, a concept that would cause the biggest crisis in Australian general practice in twenty years.

"Health bureaucrats want fundholding.  Doctors don't.  Patients don't.

"For the ADGP to even consider importing NZ-style fundholding and prescribing practices to Australia is an insult to all Australian doctors that will rob patients of quality care.

"While our system is not perfect at the moment, we are at a higher point of the GP evolution ladder than our Kiwi counterparts."

Dr Haikerwal said the ADGP plot is all about adopting prescribing systems that deliver no extra benefits to patients but deliver potential big profits to Divisions - and shift Australian health dollars offshore.

"The New Zealanders may be happy with their system but they do not have in place many of the elements that make GP prescribing in Australia more independent, efficient and patient-based.

"We have the National Prescribing Service (NPS), the Australian Pharmaceutical Advisory Council (APAC), and the Pharmaceutical Health and Rational Use of Medicines (PHARM).

"We also have independent evidence based, quality prescribing resources such as the Australian Medicines Handbook (AMH), Therapeutics Guidelines and other sources, which must be encouraged and made more widely available to Australian GPs.

"At the core of the ADGP's shaky deal is the intention to return any savings through quality prescribing of PBS medicines to the Divisions.  This is outrageous.  This is creating a new inefficient bureaucracy to prop up an old inefficient bureaucracy.

"Any PBS prescribing savings must be returned to the PBS for the benefit of patients.

"It is a furphy and a nonsense to imply that the NZ system will provide better assistance to arthritic or obese patients, or improve general practice in any way, because our way of doing general practice is way ahead of theirs. 

"This MOU is all about putting the Divisions ahead of proper patient care.  Local Divisions and grassroots GPs will be outraged at what the ADGP is trying to do.

"The NZ Independent Practitioner Associations (IPAs) have demonstrated that they can cut costs, but their limited savings come at the high cost of limiting patient access to quality care and quality medicines.

"The ADGP plan is all about greater Government control of general practice and strangling the independence of hard-working Australian GPs who understand the needs of their patients.

"Patients of Australian GPs face a bright future of quality primary care.  To introduce a NZ-style system would make it All Black.

"The ADGP is to be condemned for selling out Australian GPs and their patients," Dr Haikerwal said.

Dr Haikerwal said the ADGP has compounded its treachery by selectively quoting from an AMA Resolution on Fundholding in its 8 September Media Release.  The selective quoting implied the AMA would support the fundholding initiatives contained in the ADGP's NZ MOU.

"Fundholding is an alien concept for Australian GPs with few, if any, tangible benefits to patients.  The AMA resolution clearly spells out the dangers and recommends extreme caution," Dr Haikerwal said.

The full AMA Resolution is attached.

9 September 2004

CONTACT:     John Flannery   (02) 6270 5477 / (0419) 494 761