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GPs Told They Must Check For Brittle Bones
This would mean including osteoporosis as a priority and the recording of fractures and drug treatment for patients diagnosed with the disease.
Incentives for doctors will come into play next year, meaning that for the first time GPs’ pay will be party depend on checking patients for osteoporosis. This will hopefully ensure that patients who break a bone are no longer unnoticed and instead followed up with a referral to a fracture clinic for thorough diagnosis and treatment.
It is hoped that these new incentives will encourage GPs to insist on the follow up checks of patients, thus boosting the utilisation of fracture liaison services.
With osteoporosis affecting an estimated three million people in the UK alone, these incentives provide a welcome relief for many sufferers of the disease.