HC Deb 25 July 1989 vol 157 cc847-8
13. Mr. Baldry

To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make a statement on the effects of the new general practitioners' contract on health promotion clinics.

19. Mr. Harry Greenway

To ask the Secretary of State for Health what are the implications of the new general practitioners' contract for preventive health care.

Mr. Mellor

The new contract forms an important part of our policy of encouraging health promotion and the prevention of ill health. GPs' terms of service will make clear their role in these areas, and there will be new payments encouraging the provision of health promotion clinics, check-ups for newly registered patients and help to achieve high levels of coverage for cervical cancer screening and childhood immunisations.

Mr. Baldry

I thank my hon. and learned Friend for that reply. Does he agree that the provision for the first time of an incentive to general practitioners to run health promotion clinics will greatly improve the quality of patient care and provide GPs with the opportunity not just to react to problems as they come through their doors but to raise the quality of health of the patients on their lists?

Mr. Mellor

Yes, it is absolutely vital that the NHS becomes a service for health and not just a service for sickness. The way in which we have chosen to have a contract that is performance related will, for the first time, properly reward those who take the initiative in preventive medicine, rather than merely reward those who have been in practice for a long time, unrelated to performance.

Mr. Greenway

Can my hon. and learned Friend confirm that in terms of preventive medicine, the new contract for GPs will, for the first time, require them to visit elderly patients, that they will be paid to make those visits and that the visits will have to take place at least once a year? Will he confirm that they will be thorough visits and that the elderly people being visited will be properly looked after?

Mr. Mellor

For the first time, GPs will be paid more for having elderly patients on their lists. I find it astonishing, therefore, that the charge should be levelled at the contract that somehow it will make it more difficult for elderly patients to get treatment, when for the first time they are singled out as being patients whose care requires extra payment from the state.