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Survey of members on the accreditation process

The RACGP is responsible for writing the Standards for general practices that are used in accreditation. The Standards are developed with input and feedback from the general practice profession and other stakeholders.

The process of Standards development is overseen by the RACGP National Standing Committee on Standards for General Practices. This Committee consists of GPs, a practice nurse, practice manager and consumer representative. New Standards are endorsed by the RACGP Council.

The RACGP Standards for general practices are subject to a rigorous accreditation process through the International Society for Quality in Healthcare.

Once the Standards are released, the accreditation agencies, AGPAL and GPA ACCREDITATION plus, are responsible for providing practice survey visits and assessing how well a practice meets the requirements of accreditation.

The RACGP and the accreditation liaise frequently on issues such as the interpretation of the Standards, their application in various settings, and the accreditation process.

The current accreditation process involves the following steps:

• Performing a Patient Feedback assessment, such as a Patient Survey
• Practice self assessment
• Practice survey visit conducted by agency surveyors, one of whom is a GP.
• Review of feedback from surveyors, and recommendations for improvement provided to the practice
• The practice works on recommendations over the next three years.

This process currently occurs once every three years.

The accreditation process is currently being reviewed by the RACGP and accreditation agencies.

Your views on accreditation and how the RACGP maintains the Standards are being sought.

Size of your practice?	Solo (<=2 GP FTE) Medium (2-5 GP FTE) Large ( >= 6 GP FTE)
Practice type	Private Corporate Community AMS Other
RA classification	RA1 - Major Cities of Australia RA2 - Inner Regional Australia RA3 - Outer Regional Australia RA4 - Remote Australia RA5 - Very Remote Australia
State	ACT NSW VIC QLD SA WA TAS NT
Information Management System	Fully computerised (solely electronic based records) Hybrid (combination of paper/electronic based records) Fully paper (only paper based records)
Accreditation Status	First Accreditation (Re)accreditation
I am a:	General practitioner Practice manager Practice nurse Other

Please provide your thoughts on the following questions:

What motivates you to seek accreditation/reaccreditation? For example, is it to get access to PIP? Do you think it helps you run your business well? Does it help you provide a safe, high quality service to your patients?

What do you think the accreditation process should involve? For example, should there random short notice visits? Should there be a variable length cycle, e.g. between 2 years for practices not doing so well to 4 years for practices that perform well? How can accreditation activities be more closely aligned to achieving compulsory continuing education requirements?

A recently reported case which resulted in a patient infecting her partner with HIV was reported in the mainstream news media. The apparent cause was a breakdown of the practice’s follow up of tests and results. At present there is no complaints management mechanism in place.

How should serious breaches of the Standards by an accredited practice, between survey visits, be managed? For example, if a complaint is received by the accreditation agencies, this may trigger a visit from a surveyor.

At present the RACGP releases a new edition of the Standards for general practices approximately every 5 years. This is seen by many as being impractical for keeping up with changes in the profession and the healthcare environment.

How should the RACGP keep the Standards for general practices up to date? For example should the RACGP publish revisions/ addenda when there is a need for an update between the release of major editions?