The BMA and Welsh Government has signed off pay details of new national enhanced services on care homes and warfarin management with plans to agree the diabetes service by the end of June.
A raft of directed enhanced services for 2017/18 which come with £13.3 million in additional funding were announced at the Wales BMA annual conference on 4 March.
In a letter to the Wales GPC chair sent this week, Grant Duncan, deputy director for primary care, confirmed that GP practices will be paid £270 a year per resident to provide care to patients in residential care homes and nursing homes from the 1 April 2017.
Under plans for a warfarin management DES, GPs offering a ‘level 4 service’ will be paid £150 a year per patient with test strips; quality assurance; software and machines to be paid for by health boards.
Any practice choosing not to provide the service will be paid £10 per patient to cover administration costs of communicating with those carrying out warfarin testing.
For most of Wales, the service will come into force in April but Abertawe Bro Morganwwg and Betsi Cadwaladr health boards will be offering warfarin management from October 2017, the letter said.
Full service specifications are set to be agreed by the end of this month.
Diabetes management is set to be offered through a local enhanced service ‘in accordance with an agreed common service specification’.
The costs of delivering the diabetes service have yet to be announced.
Negotiations for a new GMS contract for Wales will take place this year, Mr Duncan confirmed.
Talks will be focused on finding a solution to rising professional indemnity costs, reforming QOF, looking into alternative contractual models, and ways to reduce non-core work for GPs.
