Northern beaches GP’s COVID-19 plea to PM: Shut doctor’s surgeries
A GP with colleagues in the UK says Australia has a crystal ball into its future, as he suggests how Prime Minister Scott Morrison can help halt the spread of the virus.
Manly
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A northern beaches GP says the government is not moving fast enough to stop the coronavirus pandemic and should force all doctor’s surgeries to shut their doors now and only do phone appointments.
Dr Joseph Besser, a GP at Dee Why Family Medical Centre, has written an open letter to Prime Minister Scott Morrison calling for the changes to happen tomorrow.
He said all practices should do telephone triage only, where a doctor can ascertain whether a patient needs face-to-face treatment and if so who is most appropriate to do it.
He said otherwise the virus will spread through waiting rooms.
The UK-born doctor said his GP colleagues in the UK have already stopped seeing patients face-to-face, while his friends working in UK hospitals say the situation is tough.
“They are predicting a very bleak outcome,” Dr Besser said.
“In Australia, it’s almost like we have a crystal ball and can see into our future.
“This is coming whether we like it or not
“We can get a jump on this.”
Dr Besser said six GPs at his practice were now doing telephone triage, while the other four GPs were completing their appointments already booked, but would be moving to telephone triage as soon as possible.
The result was the number of patients in the waiting room is vastly reduced.
However Dr Besser said he was worried other practices on the northern beaches were just carrying on as normal and called for the Prime Minister to force them to change their ways.
“This needs to happen immediately,” he wrote in a letter to Mr Morrison.
“Closing doors would send a powerful message to the community that we are on the precipice of one of the biggest medical emergencies in the last 100 years.”
Dr Besser told the Manly Daily that he wanted the public to know these changes were needed for their safety.
“My message to people on the northern beaches is from our perspective as GPs we really care about you, we really want to keep you well,” he said.
“We are adapting everyday to keep you well.
“The way we are doing things will change dramatically in the next couple of weeks.
We are doing things with your best interests at heart.”
His colleague Dr Michael Wallace added that anyone who needs to see a GP should consider whether a face-to-face appointment was necessary and from next week
bulk billed telephone consultations are available through Medicare.
He added that at present their practice, like others across the northern beaches, are not taking any new patients.
Dr Joseph’s letter to Prime Minister Scott Morrison in full:
Dear Mr Morrison,
I am a GP in Dee Why. I would desperately like to reach out to you about what GPs are doing to control the COVID-19 virus.
We need to shut doors at all GP surgeries urgently and swap immediately to telephone call triaging. We need your help with this. All GPs work independently and have no cohesion. This needs to change tomorrow. Myself and several colleagues have swapped to telephone only calls with a dramatic decline in the number of patients sitting in our waiting rooms. This means we can deal with simple requests (scripts, referrals, advice on isolation) without contaminating other patients in the waiting room. In the UK most practice’s front doors are shut. Face-to-face appointments only happen once a GP has triaged the need. My colleagues in the UK state this worked tremendously to improve isolation and distancing as patients often look to their GPs in order to work out how seriously to take the problem. When they see we are still open, they think it is business as usual. Closing doors would send a powerful message to the community that we are on the precipice of one of the biggest medical emergencies in over 100 years.
Please feel free to contact me at any time. We desperately need press help to get this message out there and you can facilitate this.
I am free any time day or night to talk to you.
All the best,
Dr Joe Besser
GP Dee Why Family Medical Centre