mygeneralpractice

26 February 2010 The journey of general practice reaches another milestone

General practice has been recommended as a medical specialty by the Medical Board of Australia, after years of advocacy by members of our college.

The Health Practitioner Regulation National Law Act 2009, requires the Board to decide before the introduction of the national registration on 1 July 2010, which medical specialties will be granted specialist recognition and listed on the Board’s Specialist Register. General practice was the first craft group to be considered and is on the list of medical specialties that are now being recommended to the Ministerial Council. The Board has also confirmed that vocationally registered GPs will be allowed to use the title ‘specialist general practitioner’, along with Fellows of the RACGP and the Australian College of Remote and Rural Medicine (ACRRM).

This is exciting news for the future of our profession and evidence of the increasing status of general practice.

We are proud to be generalists – our specialty is whole person, comprehensive and continuing care rather than just the management of a limited number of diseases or conditions. Acknowledgement as a specialist is a very important step forward towards the ongoing challenge of proper recognition and reward for our role.

This journey to recognition for general practice began in 1958 with a small group of dedicated GPs, who founded our college and worked towards defining the discipline of general practice. The college’s first examinations to assess general practice skills were in 1968, and in 1974 it became our assessment to fellowship.

In 1973, the Commonwealth Government offered a grant to begin the journey of creating a specific training program for general practice. This grant led to the Family Medicine Program, the RACGP Training Program and now the Australian General Practice Training Program.

By 1973, the government had also adopted another of the college’s recommendations to set up university departments to teach general practice in each medical school. In many cases, members of the RACGP were the founding professors. In 1978, the National Specialist Qualification Advisory Committee recognised ‘general practice is a specific and defined discipline in medicine’. In 1999, the Australian Medical Council (AMC) developed a model to assess recognition of medical specialties and recognised general practice. The AMC, in line with its national processes for the review and accreditation of specialist education and training programs, continues to accredit the RACGP’s education and training programs.

The college has also developed the first dedicated medical record system and practice accreditation processes. Research in general practice, for GPs, has also been central to the college. Our publications have included the Annals of General Practice, which then became Australian Family Physician, check and a range of other guidelines including the Guidelines for preventive activities in general practice (the ‘red book’).

This week we celebrate the recommendation by the Medical Board of Australia. We acknowledge that we could not be where we are today without the contributions of so many members of our college who have made the recognition of general practice their life’s work.

However, there is still much more to do. Since 2002, GP supply has fallen by two percent, while other specialist supply has increased by 17 percent. What this means is increased health costs and worsening health outcomes for patients.

With the recognition of GPs as specialists, it will be time to look again at the important role GPs provide in improving the health of Australia and advocate to better support that role. The government’s Medical Benefits Schedule rewards ‘specialisation’, but it should equally reward generalist and continuity of care.

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