GPs refusing to join care teams

PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE:SOME GENERAL practitioners (GPs) around the State are refusing to participate in the introduction of the Government's primary care strategy in protest at cuts in their fees.

HSE national director for integrated care Laverne McGuinness told the Dáil Public Accounts Committee yesterday it was not compulsory under their contracts for GPs to take part in primary care teams.

She said 32 primary care teams did not have any GP involvement.

A background report provided by the HSE to the committee said that there was “a distinct lack of GP participation in particular areas of the country”.

“Work is ongoing to show GPs the benefits of primary care teams, but there are still approximately 180 GPs that are refusing to join primary care teams, with many others reluctant to engage for many reasons, mostly unrelated to primary care teams developments but rather [due to] industrial relations and local historical issues.

“This figure includes a minority of GPs that have withdrawn from teams due to recent FEMPI [financial emergency legislation] cuts. In the northeast, 111 GPs recently notified of their intention to withdraw from primary care teams to the Minister for primary care. The GPs did not notify the HSE of their intention in this regard.

“However it should be noted that only six primary care teams in the northeast could possibly be affected by this decision as many of the GPs listed are not currently in primary care teams.”

The Government’s primary care strategy is based around the development of hundreds of primary care teams, where healthcare professionals of different disciplines such as GPs, nurses, physiotherapist, occupational therapists etc work together, preferably in the same location, to deal with patients. The HSE report said that in Kildare and west Wicklow, “all GPs” had withdrawn from attending primary care clinical team meetings. The reason given was that no payment was provided for attending such events.

HSE chief executive Cathal Magee said a third of primary care teams were working extremely well and dealing with up to 16 cases at meetings.

Another third of teams were average to good, while the final third was not working well, although some could be only in the early stages of development.