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Care planning templates

"Across the globe doctors are miserable because they feel like hamsters on a treadmill. They must run faster just to stay still." Morrison and Smith, BMJ, 2001

Yet in Australia and overseas mean length and frequency of visits are actually increasing. The reason we feel we need more time is that there is much more to do in our consultations.

• Time required to deliver all highly recommended preventive services 7.4 hours per day Yarnall et al. AJPH, 2003
• Time required to mange stable and controlled chronic conditions 3.5 hours per day. Treating uncontrolled conditions increases the demands to 10.6 hours per day Truls Østbye Annals of Family Medicine 2005; 3:209-214

High quality care planning allows us to use the whole practice team and the teams available outside our practice to meet the preventative care needs and the planned chronic care needs of out patients in a systematic and efficient way.

There are a number of tools and templates available to assist in care planning for our patients with chronic diseases. These templates are just one example, please feel free to use or modify them in any way that meets your needs.

These templates are based on the RACGP Red Book and SNAP (Smoking, Nutrition, Alcohol and Physical Activity recommendations and where available evidence management guidelines but you will need to review and personalise the recommendations and make your own judgement of the clinical appropriateness in the light of your own knowledge and practice. I find them helpful in my practice I hope you do too.

The Medical Benefits Schedule book contains all the requirements for a GP Management Plans and Team Care Arrangements. It is essential you check these details yourself before billing these items.

Chris Mitchell

The Templates

The prepared General Practice Management plan and Team Care Arrangements Templates are based on the Chronic Disease Self Management Program of Flinders University (CDSM). They describe the six principles of good self-management as

• Knowledge of disease
• Active involvement in decisions
• Compliance with treatment
• Monitoring of symptoms
• Use of an action plan
• Healthy lifestyle

Loading the Templates into Medical Director®

• It is important the files are not opened or altered outside of Medical Director® or the auto save functions will be lost.
• Save the files unopened onto your drive eg in a folder on the desktop
• To save them into Medical Director® - open Medical Director® Letter writer. Open a new letter. Double click on Blank Template. Move to File at the top of the screen and click on import. Select were the templates are stored and consider clicking on the box at the bottom of the fields “always open to this folder”. Double click on the chosen template.
• Save template as your chosen name and make it available (or not available) to other users under user access on the right of the field.
• Once it is loaded it can be modified according to personal preferences.

Publication Date: 21 July 2008
Authorised By: Quality care and research