Why GPs are the slow-boiling frogs of the health system
ANALYSIS: Annual incomes are down. What then is the cure?
The income issue is the general practice version of the slow-boiling frog.
Calculated before tax but after practice expenses, the latest figures show that annual incomes dropped 3% between 2016 and 2017 — the final year when the Medicare rebate freeze was in full effect.
There are hot debates at the minute: the collapse in the numbers of junior doctors opting for general practice, the effect of sky-high bulk-Âbilling rates on viability, the worrying fact that the Australian medical training factory is pumping out ever more non-GP specialists.
And in one way or another, these debates come back to the frog in the pot — the lowest remunerated specialist of all.
