Samantha Murton: Royal College of GPs President on the performance-based funding for general practices

GPs say a Government cash injection into general practices is a good start.  

The Health Minister's announced $285 million in performance-based funding for practices over three years.  

Simeon Brown is also kick-starting initiatives to boost the number of nurses and overseas-trained doctors in healthcare.  

Royal College of GPs President Samantha Murton told Mike Hosking practices need a lot more money, but the Government has to start somewhere. 

Another measure announced was the 100 new placements for overseas-trained doctors.  

The Royal College of GPs says vocational training for the doctors was always done in hospitals.  

But Murton told Hosking primary care is now getting a slice of the pie.  

She says general practices offer a wider range of training in New Zealand healthcare than hospitals. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
So movement at the GPS with a new incentive payment
for primary clinics to hire graduate nurses and new twenty
four to seven digital service for advice and scripts, as
well as one hundred placements for overseas trained doctors two
hundred and eighty five million dollars for GPS who open
their books. The College for GP's president, Samantha mertons with
as Samantha, good morning to you, good morning, How are
you very well? Indeed, this has got to be good news.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Yeah, it's the biggest price we've head into general practice
for a very long time. So it's excellent to have
this investments. It's great.

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Why then am I listening to the news bulletins this
morning full of people moaning.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
I think there's a lot of people will feel like
it's a drop in the bucket because there is so
much that needs to change in so much movement. We
need that having some feels like we need we need
so much more. But I think the thing about it
is we do need to start somewhere. No one's going
to say, look, here, have double your money and to

(00:54):
see how you go with it. We need to start incrementally.
And there was a intimation that there would be more.
So this is just the parts of it that we
know that we can do. We've got that we want
nurses just get nieces and support them to do their
training in primary care rather than the hospital. That's got
to be a good thing because otherwise they'll just stand
in the hospital forever.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
Because it is to the Prime Minister at the press
conference yesterday, once again he reiterated what I thought was
an exceedingly obvious thing. If you help at the GP level,
you're going to save at the ED end, aren't you.

Speaker 2 (01:26):
Oh totally, you absolutely are right.

Speaker 1 (01:28):
So these doctors, by the way, the overseas trained doctors,
are they that far removed from what they need to
be in New Zealand. If you come from Australia or
Britain or India or whatever it is, whatever training you
received overseas, that weird and wonderful that you have to
be retrained.

Speaker 2 (01:41):
Here for people who have trained in a jurisdiction that's
very different from ours. So it might be someone who's
trained in a setting in say China, where you don't
do medicine the way we do medicine, and or in
Pakistan or various countries that have not do not have
the same system as we do. So then they come

(02:03):
and do their indeed Rex exam, which is an exam
to say are you at our medical student level, and
then they have to do two years to get to
their general registration so that they could go off and
do vocational training in any area they want to. That's
always been that two years has always been in a

(02:24):
hospital and the hospital struggle to have these people and
take up the volume, and primary or general practice never
get to them. So being able to shift those people
to do their provisional training in the general practice setting
where they see so much stuff, any reathing that they can.
I had a lady who came from the Philippines and
she has done several of her students and in the

(02:49):
hospital and then came in to see us and went
for her second year with us, and the first day
she goes, I feel like a real doctor because we
do absolutely everything every day. So it's a great place
for people to let, excellent place for people to learn.
We do need the capacity for those training them to
supervise them, and that's one of the sticking points that

(03:11):
we need to work on, which is how do we
make sure people can supervise their students in a way
that makes sure what they are learning really well.

Speaker 1 (03:17):
So the twenty four to seven digital thing strikes me
as should have been done ten years ago. And I
mean to be able to click, and I mean that's
just more common sense, isn't it.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah, it is. And I think people want to be
able to get their care straight away and having it
digital on tap when you need it is an excellent thing.
And when you are not able to travel, I mean
I still people still drive to lots of places. They
drive to the hospital, they drive to edging here, and
having an online service is a great way. You cannot

(03:48):
do everything online, but you can do a lot online.
And if I have patients I talk to every week,
I say to them or every day, you know, let's
do this consultation online because we're just following results. They've
got somethings that are really easy to cover. But I think,
you know you're not going to have Are you going
to have a pharmacy open at eleven o'clock at night?

(04:08):
Probably not, So there's still be.

Speaker 1 (04:10):
A little bit. But I have you had a busy day,
you go nine point fifteen, you click, and you get
your script and you're there for the next morning, Archie,
as opposed to driving and waiting and checking. I mean,
it all makes sense. To meet Samantha. Yeah, nice to
talk to you. Appreciate Samantha Merton and so much moaning
in this country. Why couldn't Retty have come up with that?
What was Ritty doing all that time? You know, when

(04:31):
you're talking about click and collecting the script? Why why
wasn't this announced, you know, six months ago.

Speaker 2 (04:35):
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Speaker 1 (04:38):
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