GPs are concerned about patients missing appointments and medicine stocks running low, as fuel prices continue to soar.
By Kate Green of RNZ
The war in Iran is affecting supply chains worldwide, and recent reports claim the UK is "weeks away" from medication shortages, according to a report in The Guardian.
Luke Bradford from the Royal NZ College of GPs said shortages were "the biggest nuisance", and doctors often received little notice a medication was going to be unavailable.
It meant affected patients needed to be prescribed an alternative where possible.
Pharmac said it was closely monitoring supply risks associated with the crisis.
The impact of travel costs was mostly affecting patients, he said, rather than the doctors themselves.
"Of course, petrol has gone up massively, but I don't think there are genuinely GPs who think they can't drive to work through the cost of petrol."
Dr Jo Scott-Jones, a rural GP in Ōpōtiki and Tokoroa and clinical director for the Pinnacle Midlands Health Network, said already some rural patients were reluctant to make the trip to the GP or specialist appointments at hospitals.
"I think people really try and prioritise those things, but I have no doubt that that is happening," he said.
He said virtual consultations became commonplace during Covid, and he would like to see hospitals gear up to provide virtual outreach into the community now.
While there would be times when the specialist needed to examine a patient in-person, he said, follow-up appointments for many conditions, including post-operative follow-ups, could "very easily be done via telehealth".
If these appointments were held within a general practice, a nurse could sit alongside the patient to assist with practical checks like blood pressure, he said.
"We would have a session a week ... offering a virtual out-patient service for the hospital, and they could timetable patients to come into the surgery in Ōpōtiki, rather than making the trip to Whakatane or Tauranga," he said.
It would mean shifting some of the burden of care from the hospital to the GP, "and obviously that needs to come with some resources".
The Government announced last month almost 150,000 families would receive an extra $50 a week to help with petrol costs, and on Thursday, announced it was temporarily increasing the mileage rate for home and community support workers by 30%.
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