First year of practice visits for the Rural Depression Anxiety Research and Treatment General Practice program.

Objective: To describe the first 12 months activities of a key component of a General Practice Psychiatry program - the GP practice visit.

Design: Questionnaire to evaluate effects on participating general practitioners practice.

Setting: Rural group general practices.

Subjects: Thirty-two general practitioners in the Loddon Campaspe Southern Mallee region in Victoria.

Interventions: Practice visits involved a combination of each of three key activities: primary consultation, secondary consultation and/or case discussion and formal teaching.

Results: General practitioners reported a variety of changes in their practice as a result of the visits.

Conclusion: Practice visits appear to be a useful means of influencing GP's practice. Further work is required to determine whether such changes are accompanied by demonstrable benefits in patient outcome.

What Is Already Known: Several models to assist GPs effectively manage mental health problems have been described. These models require regular contact and so have had limited utility in rural settings.

What This Study Adds: This study suggests that infrequent contact or input, based on well established models, can alter GP's clinical behaviour.