GPRA Futures Profile: Alan Ma
I work as a clinical geneticist at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead in Western Sydney, where I see mainly kids with rare genetic disorders, syndromes, and conditions. I also work as an academic for the University of Sydney where I help deliver a postgraduate Masters program in genomics and precision medicine, and teach med students about genomics, as well as short courses in genomics.
My research is in implementation of genomics, particularly in primary care and also in tertiary care, and rare disease gene discovery.
How is genomics applicable to general practitioners, including those in rural and remote areas?
Genomics is increasingly relevant to GPs in every area. In pregnancy and planning, all couples can now have Medicare-funded reproductive genetic carrier screening. In cancer, many patients can have genomic testing of their tumours and for cancer predispositions. Many chromosomal and other genetic conditions like haemachromatosis, hypercholesterolemia, thalassemia, cystic fibrosis and Fragile X are now tested in primary care, with Medicare rebates.
Genomics is relevant throughout a person’s lifespan and increasingly relevant beyond ‘rare’ diseases into common things like high cholesterol, pharmacogenomics, and population carrier screening. For rural GPs, there is a lot less local support for genetics since there are no rural based genetic services, which means they need to handle these even more independently, and we are looking at ways to help our rural GPs upskill rapidly in genomics.
What is your view on how genomics will assist/change general practice in the future? Can you outline your recent research/project that involved co-design with GPs, the next steps for genomics and its application, and the value GPs brought to your research/project?
As I mentioned, genomics is moving beyond the rare. Common diseases like coronary artery disease, depression and asthma all have genetic underpinnings. Polygenic risk is going to be the next big thing in primary care – knowing the polygenic risk for cancer, glaucoma and a host of other common illnesses will help stratify who needs to be screened, aggressively treated, and who is at high or low risk before onset of symptoms, truly delivering ‘personalised’ medicine and lifestyle changes to address these and improve health.
Currently I’m involved in PRECISE, a project funded by the Medical Research Future Fund to implement genomics into primary care, and we have co-designed Australia’s first and only genomics portal for GPs, with GPs at www.medcast.com.au/genomics. This gives GPs clear guidance on how to do genomic testing, refer appropriately and manage genetic risk in cancer and pregnancy.
In the future, we hope to expand into pharmacogenomics, which is increasingly relevant. Working with GPs and education platforms like Medcast, which will be coming to Best Practice soon, was so enlightening – in teaching us what GPs need and want, and how they want this delivered. We are currently evaluating our program with GPs with surveys and paid interviews. If you are interested, please use the attached flyer to sign up!
There needs to be less fragmentation of care and better systems that talk to each other so a person’s genomic data can move between sectors, states, and cities. There needs to be curriculum reform (RACGP is working on a new genetic curriculum!) so that future doctors will learn about genomics and its increasing role in practice.
There needs to be better links between genetic services, which are mainly in tertiary hospitals, with public health and primary care, including new models like embedded genetic counsellors and more private options.
If you are a GP, registrar or New Fellow, how can you best educate or upskill in this area of medicine?
There are a few things. Firstly, check out our portal at Medcast. Secondly, we run short courses at the University of Sydney on genomics, and finally, I’m trying to set up a RACGP Special Interest Group (SIG) in genomics and precision medicine!
If any readers are interested in joining the SIG, please let me know as we’re trying to reach a quorum. You don’t need to be an expert in genomics, just interested and willing to participate. Please contact me at alan.ma@sydney.edu.au if you want to join!
In 10 years’ time, how do you hope GPs will be engaging with genomics? What will be the benefits to patients?
This will just be part of standard practice. Hopefully they will have new tools such as AI and single patient records to help decipher and reveal patients’ genomic data and impact on health.
Patients will know their genomic profile, risks for common (and rare) conditions, medication reactions, and receive holistic, lifelong care from GPs empowered to manage their risks and prevent diseases before they happen.
GPRA’s Head Office will be closed from Tuesday 24 December 2023, reopening Monday 6 January 2024.
We wish you all a wonderful Festive Season and a Happy New Year! Enjoy a well-earned break.
Re-thinking general practice beyond the clinic walls
Dr Gaveen Jayarajan (MediRecords) shares how mobile, cloud-enabled practice models can expand access, improve efficiency, and support sustainable care for older Australians.
Check out MediRecords here: https://medirecords.com/
Can you please give a brief overview of your career to date, including qualifications and career pathway?
I graduated from The University of Melbourne in 2003 then worked in public and private hospitals as a resident and locum doctor for 4 years before starting my GP training, which I finished in 2010. I then worked full-time in several GP clinics till 2017, after which I moved to focus on full-time work in aged care, only visiting residential aged care facilities as part of a mobile GP practice. In 2022 I started my own solo mobile GP practice, Doctors in Aged Care, and continue this work today.
This year we became one of the first AGPAL-accredited mobile GP practices in Australia, accredited under the RACGP 5th Standards as a non-traditional practice without a physical premises/consulting rooms.
Doctors in Aged Care also has a dedicated Facebook Group with over 2700 doctor members where peer-to-peer learning and discussion occurs about all things related to aged care from administration, Medicare, clinical and organisational aspects.
What is the product/work you are using/leading?
I use MediRecords as my clinical and practice management software as it gives me much greater reliability and speed working in mobile settings and without relying on remote access connections to access server-based software. It also provides much greater security along with automatic backups and ensures my IT costs are kept to a minimum by avoiding the need to pay for expensive third party IT service providers and maintaining hardware such as servers.
I also use Snapforms for various online forms that integrate directly into MediRecords and can auto-populate fields — for example, using an online new patient registration form that automatically creates a new patient file in MediRecords with certain demographic fields populated and a copy of the form automatically uploaded to the Correspondence tab.
I don’t use any AI software at present, but I do use a text shortcut software called Phrase Express to speed up my note-taking significantly.
Image supplied by MediRecords
What do you see as some of the enablers and barriers to health innovation in primary care in Australia?
Enablers include the current economic climate with rising costs across the board meaning we need to find new ways of doing things in order to be leaner, more efficient and thus more financially sustainable. I think there is openness to such innovation amongst the GP community.
Barriers include current operating models where GPs are operating their own independent medical practices within a common physical premises with the Practice Owner providing administrative and support services. Owners somehow need to cater to the needs of these individual GPs running their own practices and be able to customise their offering to each GP without increasing their costs too much.
A significant change — like a change of practice software — is harder to achieve in this situation as buy-in from many independent doctors is needed, who won’t necessarily see any direct financial benefit if their services fees remain the same and may be resistant to alterations to their usual workflows.
What do you think the future of general practice looks like?
I think the future of general practice will need to move towards one that is underpinned by modern cloud-based software that is more secure, scalable and interoperable. One where face-to-face visits are complemented by phone and video consultations as well as asynchronous communications via cloud-based patient portals, where patients have more access and visibility over their own patient health records.
It will incorporate new operating models such as the use of more virtual or remote administrative and support staff to reduce operating costs and improve financial sustainability. GPs must expand their service offerings and become more accessible to counter the effects of the Telehealth/Online-only providers that are providing more convenience to patients, but without the continuity of care that patients should expect.
Image supplied by MediRecords
Why is it important GPs are involved in health innovation/new technology design?
GPs should be involved in the early stages so the products built are fit for purpose and designed with fewer iterations and ultimately lesser time and cost. Incorrectly designed software will get very little traction amongst GPs, who will not have the time to see patients and adjust to this with work-arounds.
What would you say to early career doctors about general practice/primary healthcare?
Early career doctors should ensure they get the broadest exposure to General Practice through the different medical centres they work in, and later on consider sub-specialisation into a niche area that suits their interests and abilities and meets their financial and lifestyle objectives and family needs.
Let the work fit into your life, not the other way round!
Bridging clinical care and responsible health innovation
Dr Jagdeesh Singh Dhaliwal (Honeysuckle Health) shares how GP leadership and clinician insight are essential to integrating new technologies into primary care in ways that strengthen—not replace—human care.
Check out Honeysuckle Health here: https://honeysucklehealth.com.au/
Can you please provide a brief overview of your career to date?
I trained as a family doctor in the UK and have worked across a wide range of clinical and leadership roles in health services, academia, and technology. Over the years, I’ve served as a GP, medical educator, clinical director, and chief medical officer, with a particular focus on improving systems of care. My work has spanned the NHS in the UK and the health system in Australia, and I’ve been recognised with awards such as the Royal College of General Practitioners’ Education Excellence Award. A constant thread in my career has been connecting people — clinicians, innovators, policymakers — to improve healthcare delivery and open mindsets to new possibilities.
What is the product/work you are leading?
As Chief Medical Officer at Honeysuckle Health, I’m currently leading work at the intersection of clinical practice and technology. My focus is on supporting responsible integration of emerging technologies — including AI — into general practice. This isn’t about replacing the human doctor–patient relationship but strengthening it. I help clinicians and organisations understand how to harness tools that can free up time, reduce administrative load, and improve patient outcomes. My role often involves bridging two worlds: translating the realities of frontline primary care to technology developers, while also helping GPs feel empowered and equipped to shape the tools being built for them.
What do you see as some of the enablers and barriers to health innovation in primary care in Australia?
Enablers:
Barriers:
What do you think the future of general practice looks like?
I see general practice remaining the backbone of the health system — but evolving into a more team-based, tech-enabled, and patient-centred environment. The GP of the future will still be the trusted clinician who holds the long-term story of the patient, but they’ll be supported by smarter systems, data-driven insights, and multidisciplinary teams. Routine administrative tasks will increasingly be automated, allowing more time for human connection, which is what patients value most. If we get it right, general practice will become more attractive, sustainable, and fulfilling as a career.
Why is it important GPs are involved in health innovation/new technology design?
Because lived experience matters. GPs understand the rhythm of a consultation, the pressures of a busy day, and the subtle relational aspects of care that can’t be captured in a spreadsheet. If innovation happens without our voice, tools will miss the mark — and worse, may add to the burden rather than relieve it. By being actively involved, GPs can ensure new technologies are safe, ethical, usable, and truly supportive of patient care. We’re also advocates for equity: making sure solutions don’t just serve the tech-savvy few but reach the communities most in need.
What would you say to early career doctors about general practice/primary healthcare?
I would say that general practice offers one of the richest and most human careers in medicine. You are invited into people’s lives at every stage — from newborns to centenarians — and you have the privilege of continuity and trust that few other specialties can offer. The breadth keeps you intellectually challenged, while the relationships keep you grounded and inspired. Yes, the system has its pressures, but you are also entering at a time of great opportunity: to reimagine how care is delivered, to shape the tools of the future, and to be part of a profession that matters profoundly to the health of our society.
From frontline care to sustainable practice models
Dr Patrick Gough (MediBetter) shares how clinician-led billing and funding tools can strengthen the sustainability, accessibility, and future viability of general practice.
Check out MediBetter here: https://medibetter.com.au/
Can you please give a brief overview/bio of your career to date?
I began my career as a paramedic, working across South East Queensland, Far North Queensland, and remote communities. Growing up in the country shaped my desire to make a real difference in primary care, particularly in preventing the chronic diseases that often lead to emergency situations. After years of attending crises when it was often too late, I realised I could have a greater impact by becoming a GP – helping people live healthier, happier, and longer lives.
I completed my medical degree at the University of Wollongong, a rural GP-focused program, then undertook my junior doctor years at The Tweed Hospital. There, I became deeply involved in quality improvement – identifying inefficiencies and redesigning systems to support better patient care. This included securing additional funding through clinical coding optimisation to bring to the table when fighting to improving resources and staffing.
Around that time, my sister was managing a rural general practice facing the challenges of MBS funding limitations. I’ve long believed that GP-centric health systems provide the strongest return on investment and generate real economic and social benefit. My motivation evolved from improving outcomes for the patients in front of me to improving primary care funding and accessibility for all Australians.
I’ve always had an entrepreneurial streak, but shifting from a clinician mindset to an innovator mindset took time – and a stint with the London Ambulance that burned me out enough to push for change. Today, as a GP registrar and Medical Director of MediBetter, I’m committed to ensuring primary care remains affordable, accessible, and an attractive career for the next generation of doctors.
What is the product/work you are leading?
MediBetter simplifies MBS billing for clinicians by embedding support directly into their existing workflow.
Our core product – BOSS (Billing Optimisation and Support Software) – interprets consult notes and suggests relevant MBS item numbers, including many that are under-utilised. Although there are more than 1,000 GP-eligible item numbers, most GPs regularly bill just 10 to 20. BOSS unlocks missed opportunities and provides compliance guidance so clinicians can bill confidently.
We designed MediBetter to work anywhere a clinician works. We offer:
We also offer MIA – an AI chatbot trained specifically on GP-related item numbers, directing users to source references on MBS Online.
Our additional tools include Skin Logic, enabling rapid selection of excision item numbers – no dense flowcharts required.
Image provided by MediBetter
What do you see as some of the enablers and barriers to health innovation in primary care in Australia?
The enablers to health innovation in primary care are the rapid growth of AI, a diverse clinician base with an increasing number of doctors who also have business and tech skills, a vibrant startup community within the Australian healthcare tech space (increasingly clinician-led), more supportive environments for startups from a government perspective (e.g. Services Australia sharing by default), improved standardisation (FIHR), regulatory and advocacy bodies (e.g. ADIH) and ground work laid from innovators that have come before us (often standing on the shoulders of giants).
However, there are still significant barriers holding the sector back. The high cost of living and operating a new company in Australia places pressure on founders and limits their runway. Funding support remains patchy, with few grants tailored specifically to health-tech startups.
What do you think the future of general practice looks like?
In the not-too-distant future, GPs will act as conductors of a more integrated digital health ecosystem.
Patient-generated data – from wearables to apps – will flow seamlessly into clinical care. AI will help interpret trends, trigger recalls, and guide decision-making. Routine administrative tasks – check-ins, note-taking, observations – will be automated. A patient might:
The GP will maintain the pivotal role – applying clinical judgment, nuance, and human care – but supported by tools that enhance safety, efficiency, and patient engagement.
With exponential change coming in the next 5–10 years, clinicians must stay engaged in shaping how these technologies are used in practice.
Images provided by MediBetter
Why is it important GPs are involved in health innovation/new technology design?
As clinicians, we go to work each day focused on our patient care. We are trained to work with the tools that we have and deliver our care to the best of our abilities with these tools.
Our day is full of problems, but we work to address these problems using our existing tools. We rarely stop and think: “Could I build something to solve this problem?” And of the few who do stop and think that, where do you start?
Having worked in the startup space I have come to realise that there are a lot of people out there looking for problems to solve, and doctors are often in a unique position that their job is awash with problems that need solving and their domain expertise is so valuable because it’s so hard to become a doctor. For example, if you have gone through the bother of becoming a doctor, then you are too busy being a doctor, to go and build a solution for your unique problems.
Healthcare is slow and conservative, and for good reason; we want things to be well established and safe before we consider exposing them to patients. However, this means that innovation and adoption often lag behind other industries. Innovation that could improve patient care and patient outcomes. Companies need clinicians to highlight their problems and guide development to build these tools. Failure to have clinicians as the forefront of health innovation runs the risk of being overtaken by innovation in the health and wellbeing space with services that may not be as evidence-based.
What would you say to early-career doctors about general practice/primary healthcare?
Learn the MBS early in your career. A solid understanding of the MBS helps set you up financially and will keep you safe in the event of an audit. Also build up a network of specialists you trust, like and can call on when you need.
Re-imagining GP exam preparation through smarter learning
Dr Qi Zheng Ong (AceGP) shares how clinician-led, data-driven education is transforming how GP registrars prepare for Fellowship exams and build confidence for lifelong practice.
Check out AceGP here: https://acegp.com.au/
Can you please give a brief overview of your career to date?
We are both Australian GPs who have trained through the RACGP pathway and have built our clinical foundations in diverse settings, from metropolitan practices to rural and remote placements. Alongside our clinical work, we’ve always had a strong interest in medical education, digital health, and systems-level improvement.Over our careers, we found ourselves not only practising medicine but also mentoring junior doctors and medical students, refining exam preparation strategies, and experimenting with ways of making learning more efficient and evidence-based. That journey eventually led us to co-found AceGP, a tech-enabled education platform designed to modernise how GP registrars prepare for the RACGP Fellowship exams. Our work now sits at the intersection of frontline general practice
You are a leading GP in the health education space – what attracted you to diversify your career?
For both of us, education has been a constant thread throughout our careers, long before general practice. Between us, we’ve spent years tutoring, mentoring and building study resources; from high school and undergraduate teaching, to medical school peer-teaching and supporting GP registrars during Fellowship training. That early experience in teaching naturally evolved into developing structured programs and eventually co-founding AceGP, where we could scale high-quality educational support to registrars nationwide.
By the time we were GP registrars, education was already woven into our practice, but we noticed that exam preparation in general practice was still highly variable, inefficient, and largely under supported. Looking beyond our initial stages of offering tutoring to a small circle of students each year, we saw an opportunity to build something structured, scalable, and genuinely designed around how real registrars learn.
So our move into GP education wasn’t a “pivot” away from clinical work, it was a continuation of a pattern that started in high school and evolved with each stage of training. AceGP is simply the formalisation of a passion we’ve always had; helping others learn, but doing it in a way that actually works at scale.
What is the product/work you are leading?
We are the co-founders of AceGP, a next-generation learning platform built specifically for GP registrars preparing for the RACGP written exams (AKT & KFP). Our focus is not just content – it’s cognitive science, spaced learning, analytics, and exam performance coaching, all embedded in a single, smart platform.
AceGP is already used by multiple GP clinic groups and numerous individual GP registrars across Australia. Our goal is not just to help GP registrars pass exams, but to raise the standard of Australian general practice beyond route learning content for exams.
What do you see as some of the enablers and barriers to educational innovation in primary care in Australia?
There is a clear shift happening in GP education, as more registrars recognise that traditional rote learning and passive revision don’t match the way clinicians actually think or the way modern exams are structured. One of the biggest enablers is the move toward personalised, data-driven study; something which is already well-established in other high-stakes exams like the UCAT and GAMSAT, where candidates use analytics, adaptive learning, and structured revision rather than studying blindly. In contrast, those kinds of tools have been largely absent in GP specialty training, which is why platforms like AceGP are emerging to fill that gap. There is now growing acceptance that education in general practice needs to be structured, interactive, and tailored instead of one-size-fits-all.
The barriers are mostly practical, not philosophical. Registrars are studying while working full-time and often juggling family or on-call commitments, which makes consistency difficult. Supervisors do have protected teaching time, but they rarely get a full picture of a registrar’s knowledge gaps because most learning happens in the consulting room, out of direct observation. Many supervisors also trained years before the current AKT and KFP formats existed, so although they’re excellent clinicians, they may not be up-to-date on exam strategy, marking style, or common pitfalls. So even highly motivated trainees can feel under-supported, not through lack of effort from either side, but because the system hasn’t kept up to speed with how modern learning and assessment work. The opportunity now is to build education that fits into real GP life and gives supervisors, registrars, and training organisations access to the same data-driven picture of progress.
What do you think the future of general practice looks like?
General practice will continue to be the backbone of the Australian healthcare system, but the expectations on GPs are changing faster than ever. Medicine is evolving at a pace no individual can fully keep up with; new guidelines, new treatments, new screening pathways, and constant updates across every specialty. Unlike other specialists, GPs don’t get to focus on a narrow field; they are expected to know a bit of everything, all the time, from childhood rashes to complex multimorbidity to emerging pharmacotherapy. As careers progress, most GPs naturally develop areas of interest and attract certain types of patients, which means other clinical areas become less familiar and easier to lose touch with. The future of general practice will therefore rely on lifelong learning that is smarter than the current “complete 50 CPD hours and hope it sticks” model. We need data-driven systems that identify knowledge gaps, refresh areas we no longer see regularly, and support active recall rather than passive reading, so that GPs can stay confident, safe, and current across decades of practice, not just during training.
Why is it important GPs are involved in health innovation/new technology design?
Our work isn’t in clinical health-tech, but the same principle applies in education: tools designed for general practice only work when they’re shaped by people who actually understand the realities of the job. We saw that registrars needed smarter, data-driven learning support that matched how they study while working full-time, rather than relying on passive or outdated resources. That’s why GP-led input matters – whether it’s for AI scribes in clinics or digital learning platforms, the best solutions come from people who have lived the workload, time pressures and decision-making of real primary care, not from the outside looking in.
What would you say to early career doctors about general practice and primary healthcare?
General practice is the most diverse and rewarding clinical specialty you can choose. You’ll never see the same day twice, and you’ll use every part of your medical training. It’s a field where relationships matter as much as diagnoses, and where you get to care for patients over years, not just during a single admission. It also offers huge scope to shape your own career – whether you want to teach, do procedural work, build a niche interest, or balance medicine with family or other passions. If you want a specialty with flexibility, variety, autonomy and real human connection, primary care is an incredibly rewarding place to be.
Clinician-led AI for smarter consultations
Gunjan Wadhwa and Dr Ashish Wadhawan (Astra Health) share how clinician-designed AI can reduce documentation burden and support more efficient, patient-centred care in general practice.
Check out Astra Health here: https://astrahealth.ai
Can you please give a brief overview of your career to date?
Dr Ashish brings over a decade of medical experience, having worked across multiple specialties and regions in New South Wales and Queensland. His diverse career has included roles in orthopaedics, emergency medicine, paediatrics, and radiology. After years of travelling and working around the country, he has now established himself as a GP in Sydney. Passionate about delivering progressive, holistic, and individualised care, Dr Ashish is committed to improving community health. He is particularly fascinated by innovation as a way to optimise healthcare delivery for the greater good.
With a strong interest in technology, he has explored the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) to help doctors work more efficiently and streamline patient care. As an Orthopaedic Registrar at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital (RBWH), he led a multidisciplinary team in collaboration with researchers from RBWH, CSIRO, and QUT to develop an AI deep-learning tool that predicts the complexity of fractures. His work earned a significant grant from the RBWH Foundation and was presented at multiple conferences across Australia.
Today, his passion for health innovation continues through his collaboration with Astra Health, where he is focused on integrating AI into medical practice to create meaningful, lasting improvements in patient care.Outside of Medicine, he enjoys outdoor activities with his family and three kids, keeping fit and dabbles in photography.
What is the product/work you are leading?
We are developing an integrated and inclusive AI program (Astra Health), designed to help clinicians document consultations more efficiently while harnessing next-generation technology to improve the delivery of patient care.
Image provided by Astrahealth
What do you see as some of the enablers and barriers to health innovation in primary care in Australia?
Health innovation is already at the forefront of general practice, with technology advancing at a rapid pace. As clinicians, we need to embrace these tools and use them to deliver better care – just as surgeons have adopted robotics and radiologists are already using AI and advanced imaging modalities. As GPs, we should be equally open to progress, treating it as part of our ongoing professional development.
The biggest barrier, in my view, is concern about confidentiality and privacy. While these concerns are valid, there are straightforward measures that can take to address them. For example, when I use Astra Health in my practice, I ensure no patient-identifiable data is linked to the transcription, I obtain consent, and I set auto-deletion for transcriptions after 48 hours.Another barrier is scepticism about quality. Many GPs remain unconvinced that AI can produce better notes than their own. I believe AI is still in its early stages, but with more users, more data, and continuous refinement, its output will rapidly improve.
Image provided by Astrahealth
What do you think the future of general practice looks like?
General practice will only get more demanding. Many established GPs and practices I speak to are booked out days in advance, making it nearly impossible for patients to get same-day appointments with their regular GP for acute issues. This creates risk, patients may see another doctor unfamiliar with their history or turn to already overburdened emergency departments.
By incorporating health innovation and technology into everyday practice, we can increase efficiency, see more patients, improve communication with colleagues, and maintain the work–life balance that makes general practice sustainable and rewarding.
Why is it important GPs are involved in health innovation/new technology design?
Innovation and technology are the future of general practice, and clinicians must have a strong voice in shaping them. We need more doctors on the front line identifying real-world challenges and contributing to solutions that make technology practical, safe, and effective in day-to-day practice.
What would you say to early career doctors about general practice/primary healthcare?
General practice is a highly underrated career. It offers me control over my time and the ability to make a meaningful impact on my community’s health. While it has its challenges, it is deeply rewarding. Although I am committed to my profession and my patients, I am also available for my family, find time to maintain my fitness, and pursue hobbies I enjoy. It’s a career that offers both professional fulfilment and a balanced lifestyle.
