The Department of Health needs to stop its ‘nudge’ campaigns because they are confusing GPs who have done nothing wrong, Labor’s health spokesperson says.

Chris Bowen has called on the department to apologise to GPs for its latest letter campaign on co-claiming, arguing the mail-out has created unnecessary fear across the specialty.

The department wrote to 341 GPs earlier this month asking them to explain why they were billing high volumes of attendances on the same day as mental health treatment items.

But GPs labelled the initiative a “trial by statistics”, with some complaining the MBS rules on co-claiming the items were unclear and restrictive.