The latest pre-election budget suggestion from the AMA is to lift the Workforce Incentive Program – Practice Stream cap from four allied health staff to seven.
The Australian Medical Association is calling for an expansion to the number of allied health staff subsidised to work in general practice, as a federal election inches closer.
In the 2023 budget, the Commonwealth committed $445 million over five years to increase payments and introduce indexation to the Workforce Incentive Program – Practice Stream, effectively lifting the maximum payments from $25,000 per subsidy to $32,500.
But, as the AMA contends in its Modernise Medicare campaign, that increase was partially funded by “a cut to the maximum number of eligible allied health professionals in practices to four”.
From July 2023, the linkage of the Standardised Whole Patient Equivalent to the maximum incentive decreased from 5000 to 4000. It argued that this move would allow more practices to claim the maximum incentive.
The allied health professionals funded under the scheme include nurses, midwives, physiotherapists, psychologists, dieticians and diabetes educators.
If the goal is for GPs to build a collaborative model of care under one roof, the AMA said, practices should be incentivised to hire up to seven allied health professionals each.
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By the association’s math, this would cost another $400 million over four years.
“Without proper investment in practice teams now, we risk severely limiting access to the comprehensive primary care that keeps Australians healthy and out of hospital,” AMA president Dr Danielle McMullen said.
“The WIP expansion we’re proposing would pay for itself many times over by enabling better preventive care and chronic disease management.”
Dr McMullen also said that the evidence “clearly shows” that GP-led collaborative care models delivered the best results for patients.
The independent scope of practice review released late last year outlined a vision for the health system that involved opening up referral pathways to non-doctors and a new blended payment for GP practices.
No significant moves have been made to fund or implement any of the major recommendations immediately followed the release of the report.
At time of writing, no date has been set for the 2025 federal election.
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