Archived August 20 2008 - may contain information of historical interest (some links may not work)

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Enhanced Primary Care MBS Items

Project Overview

Enhanced Primary Care Discharge Demonstration Projects

In the 1999/2000 budget the Commonwealth Government introduced the Enhanced Primary Care (EPC) Medicare Benefit Schedule (MBS) items. The aim of these item numbers is to ensure that, where possible, health care is community-based, increasingly focussed on prevention, and better coordinated and directed to finding new and more effective ways to manage chronic illness.

The department together with the Commonwealth Department of Health and Aged Care and General Practice Divisions Victoria, sought to improve continuity of care for patients by using the EPC MBS items to improve linkages between public hospitals (including sub-acute inpatient services) and general practitioners in discharge planning and coordination. Public hospitals, jointly with one or more Divisions of General Practice were invited to submit proposals for demonstration projects to be funded by the Department of Human Services and the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing.

The aim of the demonstration projects was to develop a process to facilitate and demonstrate the appropriate use of the EPC Medicare Benefits items to improve linkages between hospitals and GPs in discharge planning and coordination in Victoria for patients with chronic and complex conditions.

The objectives of the demonstration projects was to develop sustainable processes that demonstrates:

• Effective means for informing relevant hospital staff and GPs about the new MBS items as they relate to improving discharge processes.
• Effective systems and processes for overcoming logistical barriers to hospital and GP involvement in discharge planning and coordination.
• Effective use of the EPC Medicare items to improve linkages between hospitals, GPs and other community providers in discharge planning and coordination.

Four demonstration projects were selected. These were:

• The North East Valley Division of General Practice, the Northern Division of General Practice and the Austin & Repatriation Medical Centre;
• The Royal Women’s Hospital in partnership with Melbourne, Western Melbourne, North West Melbourne and Ballarat and District Divisions of General Practice;
• Sisters of Charity Health Services in partnership with Melbourne, Inner Eastern Melbourne and Otway Divisions of General Practice; and
• Central Gippsland Health Service in partnership with East Gippsland Division of General Practice.

The project teams were expected to develop and implement sustainable processes to ensure improved linkages between hospitals and general practitioners for patients with chronic and complex conditions. Their challenge was to determine the barriers to the implementation of the EPC items in their health services and to find ways of over-coming the barriers.

GPDV was responsible for the day-to-day management and coordination of the projects and for producing the final report synthesising the findings from the four projects. This report - Involving GPs in safe referral home: a final report of the Victorian enhanced primary care demonstration projects, is available to be downloaded. The report details a range of recommendations targeted to Commonwealth and State Governments, hospitals and divisions of general practice.