The latest Health of the Nation report stats have pointed out key areas for improvement to unlock GP productivity.
With the RACGP’s annual Health of the Nation report set to drop after the long weekend, the college has released its final teaser focusing on GP productivity.
The report itself is slated for release on 7 October and includes responses from over 2400 GPs across Australia.
Productivity has emerged as a major factor in the 2025 report, with last year’s Health of the Nation report having notably showcased the inefficiencies of current GP administrative systems.
“If we make it easier for GPs to do their jobs, everyone benefits,” RACGP President Dr Michael Wright said.
“Cutting down on red tape would free up thousands of hours that could go back into patient care – longer consults, more appointments, and better health outcomes.
“A health system that lets GPs focus on patients is more productive, more efficient, and delivers better outcomes for everyone.”
PBS authority scripts were the source of widespread dissatisfaction this year, with 44% of GPs expressing that the need to seek approval for certain prescriptions was a waste of valuable consult time.
Wait times for these approvals contributed to this, with many doctors left on hold for up to 10 minutes, indicating that minimal to no improvement has been made since last year’s PBS audit.
The audit from 2024 found that a lack of bilateral standards between Services Australia and Health Australia were leading to poor measures of efficiency for PBS approvals.
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This matches with the latest report findings with 30% of GPs identifying administration linked to state and federal agencies as a major drain of time.
The RACGP has reiterated calls made in its submission to the Productivity Commission, such as fully integrating online PBS authorities into GP software.
Establishing stronger national standards for digital forms, as well as funding administrative work outside consults through MyMedicare was also mentioned.
“Integrating that PBS online system with our GP software is just a no brainer,” Dr Wright told The Medical Republic.
“One of the reasons that people say is the main reason why they feel they have burnout is because of the level of administration.
“Reducing that administration is a really important way to actually increase our workforce retention.
“We’re seeing the importance of cutting administrative burden in order to allow us to reduce the administrative burden on GPs that’s going to allow us to spend more time with our patients, potentially see more patients, and that’s certainly going to unlock some productivity.”
