Some regions have had rates of preventable hospital admissions 50% above the state average for more than a decade.
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People ending up in hospital for diabetes, tooth decay, or other conditions that should be treatable or manageable out of hospital is a warning sign of system failure.
This approach will help concentrate efforts on evidence and value rather than ideologically based, slash-and-burn approaches.
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The government must do more to deliver a 21st-century health system – not just to improve its standing with voters but to meet the health needs of all Australians.
GPs tend to ignore advice from guidelines not relevant to general practice.
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Many guidelines offered to GPs are based on evidence unrelated to general practice. Studies show doctors tend to ignore these guidelines which can pose a risk to patients’ health.
Three more years for Malcolm Turnbull and the Coalition.
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Scare campaigns only work if there is some anxiety to build on. Labor’s Medicare campaign plugged into a long history of Coalition ambivalence – or open hostility – towards Medicare.
Pathology in Australia is big business.
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Pathology Australia promptly abandoned its Don’t Kill Bulk Bill campaign against cuts to bulk-billing incentives after doing a deal with the federal government.
Although the Coalition is largely associated with this issue, Labor first introduced the Medicare rebate freeze in 2013 as a ‘temporary’ measure.
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Labor will lift the rebate freeze from 2017, while under the Coalition, GPs will be paid the same amount for delivering health services in 2020 as they were in 2014. So what does this mean for patients?
About a million Australians now have diabetes.
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Any health reform proposals should start by addressing public hospitals and chronic care. But successful change in these areas requires getting the state-Commonwealth funding and incentives right.
GP attendances make up just one-third of Medicare expenditure.
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Cutting Medicare rebates for GPs affects us all, whereas in-hospital private patient rebates, which only benefit the better-off, are ripe for the razor gang.
New modelling shows the Medicare rebate freeze will leave GPs A$8.43 worse off per consultation.
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With GPs facing greater economic pressure and the health minister considering legislative change to make it easier for GP to charge them, GP co-payments, like Lazarus, may rise again from the dead.
Very high GP attenders cost Medicare an average of A$3,202 in 2012-13, compared to an Australian average of A$690.
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As well as being responsible for a large share of total costs, people who visit the GP more often are more likely to live in the most disadvantaged areas, and to report being in poor health.
Medicare reform must focus on increasing value, not just cutting costs.
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The primary care reform debate of the last 15 months got off on the wrong foot. It was framed in terms of cutting government spending, with an overlay that consumers needed to bear the brunt of system…
The AMA described the proposed reimbursement changes for level B consultations as “an assault on general practice”.
AAP Image/Lukas Coch
The Australian Medical Association (AMA) has emerged from the recent brouhaha over the Abbott government’s proposed Medicare reforms as both a winner in the protection of doctors’ incomes and an apparent…
A blueprint for Medicare reform must include cost control, but also support quality and equity.
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The Abbott government is struggling with its Medicare co-payment reform, scrapping the latest version for a period of consultation, starting this week. The government claims it wants to make Medicare sustainable…
Across 38 years in tobacco control, I have been asked countless times in media interviews if I ever smoked. It’s often an early question. I always unhesitatingly explain that I did: I stopped in my mid…
The Coalition government’s proposed changes to Medicare have never managed to garner public favour.
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The government has backed down from its plan to cut Medicare rebates to doctors, which was to start on Monday, January 19, after several days of public pressure. For those not au fait with the world of…
Most people overestimate the benefits and underestimate the harms of medical intervention.
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“It might do me some good and it won’t hurt to give it a go.” How often have you heard a phrase like this? Most people have naïve optimism about medical care. That’s the finding of a systematic review…
The big losers will be ordinary patients.
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In the May budget, the Commonwealth government proposed a A$7 co-payment for GP services and tests done outside a hospital. After seven months of fierce criticism, the government abandoned those plans…
Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice and Primary Care, The University of Melbourne