DoHAC blames fall in GP visits on expanded scope

Department officials say patients may be turning away from traditional general practice, as it records a decline in the proportion of Australians accessing the MBS.

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The Department of Health and Aged Care failed in its goal to deliver Medicare services to more than 90% of Australians this year, pointing the finger at expanded scope of practice and telehealth.

According to DoHAC’s annual report for 2024, just 88.6% of Australians accessed the Medicare Benefits Schedule in the 2023-24 financial year, compared to 90.3% the year before and 94.2% the year before that, at the height of the vaccine rollout.

This was the only key performance measure for medical benefits included in the annual report this year.

Appearing at the Community Affairs senate estimates committee on Thursday, DoHAC deputy secretary for health resourcing Penny Shakespeare said the way patients accessed services was evolving.

“We’ve had situations where other health professionals have been encouraged to provide some of the services that may have been billed to Medicare by GPs in the past,” she said.

“For some years, people have needed [to visit a GP for] medical certificates because they’ve got to take the day off work.

“People can now go to a range of different professionals for those types of services.

“We think [the number of people accessing the MBS is] probably a measure of access to health services that may be not moving with the times.”

The final report from the Scope of Practice Review released earlier this week recommended opening up the MBS to nurses and allied health.

Doing so would likely increase the number of Australians accessing Medicare each year, potentially muddying the data further.

DoHAC’s annual report also mentioned non-Medicare subsidised online clinics as potential avenues.

Telehealth-only clinics like Mosh, InstantScripts and Eucalyptus-owned Pilot, Kin and Juniper cannot bill Medicare for services because patients and doctors never interact face to face.

Ms Shakespeare also said that statistics from more recent quarters, which were finalised outside of the timeframe captured in the annual report, showed an increase in GP visits.

First Assistant Secretary of Medicare Benefits Daniel McCabe added that there were significant increases in the number of people accessing Medicare services in the first three months of 2024 compared to the first three months of 2023.

To this, Shadow Health Minister Anne Ruston replied that the department “could not just cherry pick the data” it wanted to use.

Her statement was met with laughter from Finance Minister Katy Gallagher, who was representing the government at the estimates hearing.

“[The Coalition] ripped the heart out of general practice, basically, and it takes time to make investments to repair that,” Ms Gallagher said.

“That work will be ongoing for some time.”

DoHAC also failed to meet KPIs related to hearing and dental services.