General practice activity in Australia 2007-08 (AIHW)

released: 3 Oct 2008 author: Britt H, Miller GC, Charles J, Henderson J, Bayram C, Harrison C, Valenti L, Fahridin S, Pan Y & O'Halloran J media release

This publication is the 22nd in the General practice series produced by the Australian General Practice Statistics and Classification Centre, a collaborating unit of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and the University of Sydney. It reports the results of the tenth year of the BEACH program, April 2007 to March 2008. Data reported by 953 general practitioners on 95,300 GP-patient encounters are used to describe aspects of general practice in Australia: the general practitioners and their patients; the problems managed and the treatments provided. The contribution of practice nurses to the GP-patient encounters in terms of their clinical activities, the problems they assist with and the Medicare items claimed, are described in this report. Information on body weight to height ratio, smoking status and alcohol use for a subsample of patients is also provided.

ISSN 1442-3022; ISBN 978 1 74024 828 0; Cat. no. GEP 22; 160pp.; $30.00

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Publication table of contents

Preliminary material (89KB PDF)
- Half title and verso pages
- Title and verso pages
- Foreword
- Acknowledgments
- Contents
- Abbreviations
- Executive summary
Body sections
1. Overview (54KB PDF)
  1. Background
  2. The BEACH program
  3. Issues when using BEACH data with other national data
  4. Access to BEACH data
2. Methods (87KB PDF)
  1. Sampling methods
  2. Recruitment methods
  3. Data elements
  4. Supplementary Analysis of Nominated Data
  5. The BEACH relational database
  6. Statistical methods
  7. Classification of data
  8. Quality assurance
  9. Validity and reliability
  10. Other BEACH applications
3. The sample (60KB PDF)
  1. Response rate
  2. Representativeness of the GP sample
  3. Weighting the data
  4. Representativeness of the final encounter sample
  5. The weighted data set
4. The participating GPs (55KB PDF)
  1. Characteristics of the GP participants
  2. Computer use at GP practices
5. The encounters (63KB PDF)
  1. Content of the encounters
  2. Encounter type
  3. Consultation length
6. The patients (71KB PDF)
  1. Age-sex distribution of patients at encounter
  2. Other patient characteristics
  3. Patient reasons for encounter
7. Problems managed (89KB PDF)
  1. Number of problems managed at encounter
  2. Problems managed by ICPC-2 chapter
  3. Problems managed by ICPC-2 component
  4. Most frequently managed problems
  5. Most common new problems
  6. Most frequently managed chronic problems
  7. Work-related problems managed
8. Overview of management (51KB PDF)
9. Medications (106KB PDF)
  1. Source of medications
  2. Prescribed medications
  3. Medications supplied by GPs
  4. Medications advised for over-the-counter purchase
10. Other treatments (63KB PDF)
  1. Number of other treatments
  2. Clinical treatments
  3. Procedural treatments
11. Referrals and admissions (70KB PDF)
  1. Number of referrals and admissions
  2. Most frequent referrals
  3. Problems most often referred
12. Investigations (69KB PDF)
  1. Number of investigations
  2. Pathology ordering
  3. Imaging ordering
  4. Other investigations
13. Practice nurse activity (66KB PDF)
  1. Practice nurse Medicare claims versus practice nurse activity
  2. Discussion
14. Patient risk factors (89KB PDF)
  1. Body mass index
  2. Smoking (patients aged 18 years and over)
  3. Alcohol consumption (patients aged 18 years and over)
  4. Risk factor profile of adult patients
15. SAND abstracts and research tools (1.07MB PDF)
End matter
- References (34KB PDF)
- Glossary (38KB PDF)
- Appendices (173KB PDF)¹
  1. Example of a 2007-08 recording form
  2. GP characteristics questionnaire, 2007-08
  3. Dissemination of results from the BEACH program
  4. Code groups from ICPC-2 andICPC-2 PLUS
  5. Chronic code groups from ICPC-2 and ICPC-2 PLUS
- List of tables (28K PDF)
- List of figures (21K PDF)

Notes and corrections

The current version of the publication is presented above.

Previous versions of files that have been updated or corrected are presented below.

(3 October 2008) Appendices 3-5 were not available as part of the printed copy.

Recommended citation

Britt H, Miller GC, Charles J, Henderson J, Bayram C, Harrison C, Valenti L, Fahridin S, Pan Y & O'Halloran J 2008. General practice activity in Australia 2007-08. General practice series no. 22. Cat. no. GEP 22. Canberra: AIHW.

General practice activity in Australia 2007-08

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Publication table of contents

Notes and corrections

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