Consultancy to lighten GP complaints burden
A psychiatrist who specialises in doctors’ mental health is testing market appetite for a consulting service to “outsource the complaints process” for doctors who have received an AHPRA notification.
Dr Helen Schultz, a consultant psychiatrist and long-time advocate for doctors’ mental health, hopes to establish a service to handle some of the administrative and other frustrations that doctors face when a complaint is made against them.
“My aim is to provide the same level of quality care to doctors that I strived for as a benchmark in my doctor’s clinic,” Dr Schultz said. “It will not be in a clinical capacity, but as somebody with the expertise of the complaints process, how doctors react to complaints, and how to resolve the matter as efficiently as possible. It should go to the heart of reducing doctor distress.”