Doctor reports ‘not accurate’

Press, 23 March 1985, Page 9

Doctor reports ‘not accurate’

Reports that 30 doctors in the Christchurch health district had joined the new general medical services child benefit scheme were not entirely accurate, said a Medical Association spokesman yesterday. Dr David Kerr, chairman of the association’s central general practitioners’ committee, said yesterday that although the Health Department had said there were 30 doctors who had joined the scheme in the area, the figures were not so straightforward.

The 30 doctors represented about 15 per cent of the doctors in the area, but only about 6 per cent of children would benefit from their joining the scheme. He said that 10 of the

doctors were in country areas, where there was no alternative for child patients who would benefit from the scheme.

Two of the doctors were in salaried posts and would not be affected by the scheme’s maximum fee rule of $12.50 a visit. Four of the doctors were older doctors, who did not normally have as many child patients as other general practitioners.

Two of them were retired doctors, said Dr Kerr.

Another five or six doctors who had joined the scheme were in the centralcity area, where most patients were city workers and there were fewer children.

“In essence, only four or

five of the 30 doctors are in ordinary suburban practices seeing large numbers of children,” said Dr Kerr.

“I think the Minister of Health (Dr Bassett) must now realise that the time has come to meet doctors for further discussion on the scheme,” he said.

“We have to work out a way of getting the tax money coming from prescription charges across to the people for whom it is being collected.”

Dr Kerr said he thought the Health Department would be well advised to keep its records straight. “If it gives inaccurate information, it will mislead the patients,” he said.