CIVIC NEWSLETTERS

Our newsletters continue to be well-received by patients and we’re continuously working on getting this out to as many patients as possible. If patients wish not to receive these emails and updates, please select the “Unsubscribe” button located at the bottom of this email to remove your email address from our mailer list.

There are some valuable information shared in these updates and our aim is to not flood your inbox with unnecessary emails, but to keep you updated every once in a while, as to what’s happening here at Civic.

MYINDICI is our new Patient Portal.

The patient portal will allow you to book appointments, requests prescriptions, email our clinical team, see your notes, pay your account and more. Patients can access the portal via the app or from a web browser on your PC. 

To register for MYINDIC

Visit our practice along with your ID document. Once we’ve validated your identity and email address we can activate your account. For more information on the patient portal, please follow the link below or contact us on 03 578 0199

Dr Henry McKee is off again on more travels and adventures.  We wish him a safe journey and hope he will return to us later in the year. 

Lauren Young – Health Improvement Practitioner left us in December and is off to a new job and exciting challenges.  We wish her well and thank her for being a great support to our patients and to our staff.   

New Health Improvement Practitioner – We do have a new HIP arriving and we’ll let you know more soon.   They will be available to offer help with anxiety, mental health. Isolation, depression, stress/burnout, sleep problems amongst other things.   This is a free service and has been a huge help to many of our patients – we are happy this will continue.  

MAKE THE MOST OF YOUR APPOINTMENT

Doctor’ appointments are 15 minutes long. Make the most of this time with your GP.

Make a list and prioritize your concerns.  There may not be time to address all of the concerns so tackle the important ones first.   If you are unsure, show your Doctor the list and decide together.  1-2 issues are the maximum for 15 minutes to allow the Doctor to do their best work for you. 

If you are coming with a long list, consider making a double appointment to ensure there’s enough time to cover things.

Our Doctors do run late on occasion and this is frustrating for everyone.  Please ensure you use your 15 minutes well and avoid being the reason that the Doctor runs late.  Running late impacts on all the patients after you and causes pressure and angst for the Doctor and staff.  

Consider seeing another professional with some of your concerns.   See our Signpost for suggestions for where to take some concerns that may not need to wait for a Doctor.  (Link further below)

Clinical Pharmacist - Claire Livingstone

Claire is an integral part of our Civic Team and has worked with many of our patients already. Claire can help with all medication enquiries including 3-6 month reviews and repeats, offer advice on any medication problems/queries or education for patients on their medications.   

Claire is also part of the Long-Term Conditions Team and offers advise on managing Long Term Conditions such as asthma, COPD, Gout, Heart Failure and other conditions.  

Health Coach - Chris Betts

Chris is available at Civic and is able to offer advice, support and help navigate towards community support.   All consultations with Chris are free. 

Chris can help with lifestyle advice and changes, smoking cessation, advanced care plans, connecting with community resources such as WINZ, Age Concern, Budget Advice and other agencies for assistance, pre-diabetes advice, exercise and much more.   Chris provides a safe place to talk and to help find support. 

Our Clinical Pharmacist and Health Coach are just two examples of alternative clinicians who may be able to help.  This could avoid a long wait to see your GP.   See the attached signpost which offers alternatives with who you can see to help.   Talk to our reception staff about alternative clinicians that may be able to help you.  

There’s a lot of media attention lately on the lack of funding for General Practice.   The Government pay General Practice an amount per enrolled patient, for us to look after your health needs.   It is called Capitation, and this brings us about 50% of our income.  It is based on outdated historic and assumed number of consultations per year and grossly underestimates the actual workload.    

This Government funding has fallen below CPI/Inflation for all but one of the last 20 years.  This is despite reports that were commissioned by past Governments in 2021 and 2022 identifying that GPs and other clinicians are now unpaid for half the work they do and that funding needs to increase up to 3 times its current level.  

Costs have skyrocketed and we want to pay our staff what they deserve.  General Practice is working hard to make ends meet and to let the Government know that we are at a crisis point, while continuing to provide the best service that we can and managing an increasingly complex workload. 

We do have small buckets of funding other than capitation, including Careplus,  that are available to help improve chronic care management, reduce inequalities and reduce the cost of services for high-need patients. This is very limited funding and we have to share it amongst a lot of patients.   We do our best to be fair and help where we can but access to this for all patients is not a given.  We do run out of funds and we do have to share the load.  Patients may get access to this funding once or twice but it is not available all the time.

Please understand we do our best with limited funds to help where we can.

PAPERWORK, EMAILS AND THE UNPAID WORKLOAD

There is an increasing workload for our Doctors of ‘paperwork’ such as answering emails, queries, checking results, blood test request, writing referrals and acting on hospital letters etc.  A lot of this work carries over to the Doctors own time, unpaid and in time that should be spent with their families. 

Doctors are already under a lot of pressure to fit patient care into 15 minutes, which is partially funded and does not include all the paperwork follow up. We must charge for these services so please be aware of this when sending an email, dropping a form in to be completed or requesting information. A Charge will be incurred. 

NURSE TRAIGE AND NURSE PHONE CONSULTS

Due to increased costs we have had to review our prescription fees and the time taken to prepare prescriptions including input from nurses and Doctors. The costs & turnaround time reflect the input by staff required to complete the request.

When ordering a prescription from Civic, please allow 3 working days for it to be sent to the pharmacy.  The easiest way to order a prescription is through our Patient Portal. Our MyIndici Portal request requires the least amount of input and is our cheapest option so talk to us about signing up today. Otherwise, patients can call or come in and see us but please ensure you have a list of medications and dosage that you require so we can ensure we are requesting the correct ones.

If the prescription is required urgently, please talk to us and we can arrange this.  If the request is received before 2pm, we will endeavour to have it done that day.  After 2pm, the request will be done the following working day. 

Our prescription fees will now be: 

$20 for a MyIndici Portal request 

$25 for a request by phone or over the counter 

$30 for a same day/Urgent request 

For a full list of our fees please see our Website.  

We are still working hard to keep our patients and our staff safe from Covid and respiratory infections. 

Patients that phone for an urgent appointment with respiratory symptoms will be triaged and if they are needing to be seen, will be seen in our respiratory clinic.   The Clinic room is outside of the Practice and patients are asked to either wait in the Carpark or the front foyer with a mask. 

There is still quite a bit of respiratory illness, including Covid around and winter is coming, so it will only get worse.    

If you are sick, stay at home and if you need us, please call and we can make a plan to help. 

We work hard to provide appointments when they are needed.   It’s very upsetting when patients don’t attend their appointments and we could have used that space for others.    

Please consider others when you are unable to attend an appointment and give us a call to cancel.    

We do send reminder texts but please do not rely on this to remember to come.  It is the patient's responsibility to attend appointments and for various reasons, sometimes texts don’t go through.  

If an appointment is not attended without any notification, the patient will still incur the consult charge.  

Civic has recognized the need for this service and we have invested in the equipment and training for some of our nurses.    

Ear Suctioning clinics have been made available to book into with the nurses.  Please call and ask about it today.     

Costs - $60 for one ear, $80 for both ears, $30 for any follow up needed.  $10 for the oil to soften the earwax. 

HYPNOTHERAPY AND NEURAL CODING

YOUR SKIN AND HOW TO CHECK FOR CANCER

Summer is here and Summer means Sun and Fun but…. It can also mean skin cancer. 

NZ ranks Number 1 in the world for deaths due to melanoma (cancerous moles).  Australia is Number 6! 

That’s not good enough and we need your help to do better. 

Your best defense against skin cancer problems is early detection together with sun protection.

CIVIC have dedicated skin spot check clinics setup for patients to book into. 

Dr Mandy and Dr Bonnie, both trained skin cancer doctors with the Skin Cancer College, Australasia, have put aside time to check skin spots and find skin cancers early. 

We need you to do your part and SCAN your skin every 3 months, no excuses. 

SCAN your skin and bring them in –  

• S Is the lesion Sore? - tender, itchy or bleeding 

• C Has the lesion Changed? - in size, shape, colour or texture. 

• A Is the lesion Abnormal looking? - the Ugly Duckling in between

  your normal skin pattern.  

• N Is the lesion New? - specifically new moles after the age of 40.  

Visit the website ScanYourSkin for more detailed information. It may save your life!

Skin Spot Check Clinics will run regularly to have worrying lesions checked, 1-2 lesions per 15min appointment @ $50 p/a – photos, analysis and referrals included. 

These appointments are not for skin rashes, eczema or other skin conditions.  It is for a Spot or 2.  Please make a normal GP appointment for other issues. 

We also don’t do mole-mapping or annual full skin checks as we unfortunately do not have the capacity or set-up for this.  

SCAN your skin and bring us your suspicious spots. 

Let’s do better together and beat Skin Cancer…  And let’s beat Australia too! 

SKIN CHECK/PROCEDURE FEES

• $160 - Shave Biopsy

• $190 - Punch Biopsy (incl. removal of stitches/follow up)

• $300 - $400 - Excision - 30/45 Min. (incl. removal of stitches/follow up)

• $300 - $450 - Wedge Resection - 30/45 Min.

• $50 - Liquid Nitrogen (incl. children u/14yrs)

• $50 - Spot Check Clinic Consult 

• $30 - Removal of Stitches for Procedures outside of Practice