Quality is at the heart
of everything we doWho is QPA?
QPA exists to empower and support general practices to provide the highest quality care. We partner with practices to deliver better outcomes for patients that shape the future of general practice through our quality assurance, continual improvement and risk mitigation program.
Our Vision
Beyond accreditation – where a culture of quality is embedded in everything we do every day.
Our Mission
Striving for quality assurance today, for a better general practice tomorrow.
Our QPA Values:
Integrity
Ensuring that all accreditation decisions meet the intent of the relevant standards, are transparent, impartial, consistent and applied without undue or inappropriate influence.
Innovation
Continuing to develop our program and use IT tools to better support practices and bring more efficiency.
Community & Patient Focus
Ensuring that accreditation remains about patients and the community in providing assurance as to the safety and quality of general practice services.
Responsiveness
Actively listening to consumers and practices and showing tactical empathy.
Evidence-based
Continuing to strive for a strong evidence base in assessing our program development and the services we provide.
Respect for our People
Recognising that our people are in the best position to inform and guide policy and operations. We value and listen to each other and actively engage in supporting their professional and personal development.
Environmental Concern
We understand the need for individual action in regard to climate change and the environment and are striving to be a carbon neutral enterprise.
Cementing our commitment to quality
Our corporate social commitment and responsibility extends beyond general practice to our own local rural community of Gundagai, New South Wales, where QPA is proudly operated from.
Championing community connections
Through the many fundraising and awareness initiatives that our team passionately support, we aim to build and strengthen connections and pride especially within our own local community. We support causes that raise awareness and fund crucial medical research that are particularly close to our heart and that benefits members of the community who are in need.
Environmental sustainability
Committed to reducing the environmental impact of our operators, we focus on sustainable business practices and aim to continually reduce our carbon footprint.
Dr Paul Mara: at the forefront of general practice reforms for more than four decades
Dr Paul Mara AM MBBS FACRRM FRACGP FAMA
It all started to provide general practices with a choice of certification provider. For more than 26 years we’ve empowered practices to embed a culture of quality and deliver the best possible healthcare and wellbeing outcomes to patients, their families and their communities.
“At QPA, we value general practice, because we are GPs. We understand how hard it is to be a GP. One minute you can be seeing a child with a sore throat, the next managing a patient with complex chronic disease. As GPs, we understand general practice isn’t just about our patient’s problems but about their stories, where and how they live. We make a difference to people’s lives in small or large steps every day. At QPA, we don’t just accredit general practices: we understand them.”
A rural doctor with obstetrics, anaesthetics and emergency medicine skills, Dr Paul Mara practised in the iconic rural town of Gundagai NSW from 1984 until recently. In 2016 he was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia for his work in promoting rural medicine and workforce reform.
He was awarded a Fellowship of the Australian Medical Association in the same year. During the presentation, AMA President Professor Brian Owler noted:
“Few have exerted as much influence over the shape of their profession as Dr Paul Mara. The Gundagai-based GP who, with his wife Dr Virginia Wrice, has served the rural community for more than 33 years, has played a foundational role in the development of general practice in Australia, particularly in rural and remote areas. Dr Mara was a central figure behind the formation of the Rural Doctors Association of NSW and was a founding member and inaugural Vice President of the Rural Doctors Association of Australia – becoming President in 2010.
His extensive list of firsts includes being the inaugural Director of General Practice at the Federal AMA.
He was a key participant in negotiating the establishment of the Divisions of General Practice, as well as vocational registration, GP training reforms and practice enhancement grants (the prescursor to the Practice Incentive Program).
During the 1990’s and early 2000s, Dr Mara conducted trails of a national practice accreditation program, undertook a review of the rural medical workforce, and co-authored the landmark RDAA Viable Models of Rural and Remote Practice Project, which established a framework for sustainable practice in rural and remote areas.
His profound influence on gereral practice, particularly in rural areas, was recognised this year when he was appointed Member of the Order of Australia.”
Since 2016, Dr Mara has remained a strong supporter of the centrality of the role of rural and general practice in the health system. He was an invited member of the Ministerial expert advisory panel in 2023-24, examining general practice incentive programs and after hours care. He is acknowledged as the architect of the single employer model, which is designed to improved access to quality medical care for all Australians, increase training opportunities and deliver enhanced benefits for doctors working in general practice.
He is founder and Managing Director of Quality Practice Accreditation and continues to advocate strongly for general practice and for changes in the National General Practice Accreditation Scheme that benefit practices and patients. With experience across general practices large and small in both metropolitan and regional areas, he remains grounded by continuing to conduct survey visits across Australia.