Doctors are worried there will not be enough GPs to staff dozens of new urgent care clinics amid declining interest in a career in general practice.
The GP clinic is meant to cut wait times at Northern Beaches Hospital. Instead,it’s struggling to stay open.
Chemotherapy and a transplant makes it hard for Emily West to go outside,but a post-pandemic explosion in telehealth has made it easier for her to get the care she needs.
A woman who went to the GP complaining about abdominal pain during sex was told:“You’re 70 years old;of course sex is going to hurt.” Three days later,her appendix burst.
While Sydney’s most expensive gap fees were in Wentworth and Warringah,data shows,more than 75 per cent of GP clinics in nine Sydney electorates reported bulk-billing all of their patients.
In several suburban Melbourne electorates,more than 20 per cent of clinics said they stopped bulk-billing all patients during last year.
Every WA public high school student could be provided access to a bulk-billed general practitioner on school grounds who specialises in adolescent health and wellbeing.
GPs want to relieve the burden on those with chronic and complex illnesses,and to provide yearly checks for children.
The overall bulk-billing rate for the 7.8 million diagnostic imaging services carried out in Australia in the September quarter was 76.4 per cent – the lowest since the three months to December 2013.
New analysis suggests 450,000 Australians will require twice-yearly GP visits to get their vape prescriptions and warns young people could turn to tobacco if the regime is too cumbersome.
Cancer experts want free screenings for high-risk patients to detect deadly melanomas before they take hold,as people delay checks due to the rising out-of-pocket cost.