Monitoring the impact of COVID 19 on general practice

Impact measures report

The Centre for Health Systems and Safety Research at the Australian Institute of Health Innovation, Macquarie University is pleased to announce the publication of a new report “Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 on general practice- A suite of impact measures for Australian General Practice”.

The report is a deliverable of a research project titled COVID-19 – utilising near real-time electronic Australian general practice data to establish effective care and best-practice policy which was undertaken as a collaboration between the Digital Health Cooperative Research Centre, Macquarie University, Outcome Health, Gippsland, Eastern Melbourne and South Eastern Melbourne Primary Health Networks (PHNs), and the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia Quality Assurance Programs, with participation from Central and Eastern Sydney and South Western Sydney PHNs. The project was funded by the Digital Health Co-operative Research Centre with project ethics approval provided by Macquarie University Human Research Ethics Committee.

During the project, de-identified general practice data from the Population Level Analysis and Reporting (POLAR) platform was analysed to produce a series of ‘Snapshot’ reports which provided PHN’s with important evidence for the impact of the pandemic on general practice activity during the first and second waves of the pandemic.

The new report defines a suite of ten impact measures for general practice:

Impact Measure 1 – Medication prescribing volumes
Impact Measure 2 – Telehealth consultation in general practice, its use and patient factors
Impact Measure 3 – Pathology test request volumes
Impact Measure 4 – Non-acute respiratory illness testing volumes and demographics
Impact Measure 5 – Proportion of telehealth consultations in residential aged care facilities
Impact Measure 6 – HbA1c monitoring in type 2 diabetes – HbA1c testing volume
Impact Measure 7 – HbA1c monitoring in type 2 diabetes- HbA1c testing frequency and HbA1c levels
Impact Measure 8 – Cancer screening in general practice
Impact Measure 9 – Pathology referrals during telehealth consultations
Impact Measure 10 – Mental health consultation volumes

The proposed suite of impact measures can be used to determine the direct and indirect impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on general practice activity both retrospectively and into the future. The impact measures also have the potential to be utilised as part of electronic decision support aids (e.g., dashboard) to allow visualisation of the impact of waves of the pandemic on general practice and to support ongoing quality improvement activities by PHNs and Australian general practices.

The report is available as an open access publication and may be accessed using the following link: “Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 on general practice- A suite of impact measures for Australian General Practice”

For further information, please contact Professor Andrew Georgiou.

CENTRES RELATED TO THIS NEWS

Centre for Health Systems and Safety Research

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT

Chrissy Clay, Research Outreach Coordinator

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