General Practice Ownership

Does it really matter who owns the General Practice (GP)business? Yes. No. Maybe…

I realise that I was potentially misleading readers by referring to the ownership of the General Practice ‘business’ in this blog! It isn’t necessarily about owning the practice… So I started asking the question “does it really matter WHO owns the business” ? I know of many different ownership models around New Zealand where general practices are owned by non-medical people, (eg. retired pig farmer) nurses and doctors, nurses alone and other ownership models. They all work, and have different models of practice.  The initial ownership of Pleasant Point was the historical Dr-owned practice, and then in 2014 became Nurse owned.

Some of the obvious advantages in owning a practice you also work in are simple things like, you don’t have to ask, beg or borrow – for days off. So you buy yourself a job and security? You can decide on your remuneration and maybe the hours you want to work.  These aspects are a definite advantage.  BUT, actually its about the model of health care delivery that you want to deliver that makes ownership an issue or not.

The advantage we have found in ownership of the practice has been the ability to influence change by offering a different model of care to that which has historically been delivered.  In the case of the Pleasant Point Health Center this has meant an NP-led clinic and registered nurses working at the top of their scope of practice five days a week. The GP-Dr input only being for those patients with more complex needs. This model is based on how I have experienced general practice to operate over the years in rural areas, where the Dr availability has been limited. This demonstrated that with the right mix of skills, nurses can provide a significant part of primary health care safely and effectively.  This allows the GP-Dr expertise to be better utilised. In an era where the GP workforce are ageing  and there are less of them, this seems a more effective use of their skills.