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General practice registrars and rural generalist trainees may be provided with access to a modern training environment where not only can they access current digital tools but also develop new ones.
General Practice Registrars Australia (GPRA) has recently partnered with MediRecords to provide its membership of around 20,000 GP trainees with exclusive discounts and access to a widely adopted clinical and practice management system (PMS).
MediRecords' fully cloud-based PMS provides secure, mobile access to patient records from anywhere without on-site servers. It has API connectivity, allowing integration with other digital applications.
WHY IT MATTERS
The partnership aims to help early-career GPs and RGs future-proof their practices through using a digital platform that supports flexible models of care and enhances care delivery.
According to a GPRA spokesperson, members have been seeking various ways to deliver care flexibly, citing how "technology will continue to influence GP care delivery… across Australia's vast and varied landscapes."
"[W]e understand products like MediRecords are helping medical practitioners connect with their patients and communities," the spokesperson told Healthcare IT News.
"This partnership gives new doctors earlier exposure to the digital foundations of modern general practice, from AI-supported clinical use cases to using standards like SNOMED and FHIR, and understanding how mixed billing works in the real world," Matthew Galetto, MediRecords founder and CEO, explained in a separate interview.
The partnership also intends to help budding GPs and RGs build proficiency in highly-regulated tools and workflows, "so when they step into private or mixed practice, the shift feels more natural and a lot less overwhelming."
"Being cloud-based means registrars can access it from anywhere, and the clean, intuitive interface matches the kind of digital experiences younger doctors are already used to as consumers," Galetto said about their PMS.
"It all reduces learning friction and fits neatly with today's expectations for connected, modern clinical systems," he added.
While limited internet connectivity remains a hurdle for RGs adopting cloud-based PMS in remote communities, "the alternative — carrying paper files or keeping local copies on a laptop — feels like a step backwards, especially when secure, modern connectivity is finally catching up to the needs of remote practice," Galetto maintained.
MediRecords is exploring opportunities to extend its partnership with GPRA to tackle the growing healthcare workforce shortage.
"A big part of that is creating space for safe, meaningful innovation, giving trainees access to modern digital tools, opening up our API ecosystem in a structured way, and helping lift digital capability across the board," the company's CEO said.
THE LARGER TREND
Early this year, the Australian Digital Health Agency started working with universities to integrate digital health education into undergraduate health degrees, pursuing a consistent approach to teaching digital health nationwide amid persisting workforce pressures.
The state of Victoria has also piloted a digital health upskilling programme for frontline, clinical and IT staff.
Outside Australia, New Zealand has recently started deploying AI scribes to emergency clinicians, helping free up their time, while the Ministry of Health and Welfare in South Korea has funded leading universities to offer specialised courses on AI in healthcare, aiming to produce over 1,000 AI healthcare professionals by 2029.
In Singapore, 1Doc of the fin-medtech company iAPPS Health Group is introducing next year an educational pathway for training health coaches and community health professionals in AI-enabled, digitally driven care.
