The Foundation Standard
Completion of The Foundation Standard is compulsory for general practices in Aotearoa who wish to receive Government funding.
The first step in The Foundation Standard is the self-assessment, which is completed in Smartsheet. Practices can access the right tool through the practice administration portal.
Practices need to provide evidence that they have met the criteria of 15 quality assurance indicators, which are grouped into five areas:
The practice initially completes their self-assessment, which includes providing written comments for each of the 15 indicators. The practice team also uploads evidence such as photos, policies, survey results, and other documentation for each criterion, which sit within the indicators.
Once the practice is satisfied that they have met each criterion, they will mark these as ‘met’. All criteria must be marked as ‘met’ before the assessment visit can occur.
College-endorsed assessor visit
After practices have completed their self-assessment and believe they are ready for their assessment of The Foundation Standard they need to find an assessor to complete both an onsite and online assessment.
Practices need to kōrero directly with their assessor to establish a fee and schedule, as all assessors set their own rates and manage their own work schedule. The practice will also need to understand how the assessment day will run and make a date for the on-site visit.
Once the assessor has completed the assessment and can confirm that the practice has met all the indicators, they will recommend that the College award Foundation Standard certification.
Guidance and tautoko
The College provides all practices with detailed guidance for every indicator in the Foundation Standard. The guidance is a living document and designed for use with the Standard so that practices understand what the requirements are and how to meet them.
Team members
Team members refers to people employed at the practice or who work in the practice on a regular basis , this would exclude short term locums covering for GPs on leave. It would also include others working alongside the team for a set period of time. For example, GP registrars, and nursing and medical students. Please note, practices should ensure that short term locums have current APCs, CPR certificates, safety checks as well any other training the practice may determine, such as Treaty of Waitangi and privacy training.
At times The Foundation Standard requires ‘all’ team members to complete an activity or training. Students and registrars should be included as part of the team in the practice’s improvement initiatives, medical emergency drills, evacuation drills and the reporting of incidents and accidents.
You're not required to include GP registrars, nursing and medical students in other team training or to allocate CPD points.