GPs seek money for MHR participation

DESPITE the Practice Incentive Payment eHealth Initiative (ePIP) which pays general practices for uploading information to the My Health Record (MHR) platform, the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners is still calling for extra financial incentives to be paid to GPs for participation in the digital health system.

An RACGP position statement on MHR referred to the “time and effort” required to upload records“which might appear to have no initial direct benefit to the general practice, as the relevant information is already in the local clinical information system.

“There is, however, a potential benefit to other healthcare providers and therefore the patient.

“As a key contributor to My Health Record... general practice should be financially supported to participate through an appropriate incentive scheme,” the RACGP said.

The College said incentives should be service-based, paid to individual healthcare providers responsible for uploading, and support the upload of accurate, high quality data onto the system.

At last count, on 01 Jul, there were 6,483 GP organisations registered, 3,233 pharmacies and around 24% of the general population, MHR data shows.

See the full position statement at www.racgp.org.au.