Practice support facilitators based in Dunedin, Alexandra and Invercargill would focus on increasing the numbers of patients using funded services like cervical smear tests and cardiovascular testing.
The issue was most felt in the sparsely populated parts of Otago and Southland, which affected income levels in some practices, he said.
"It's tough going out there for some of those smaller practices," Mr Macara said.
The practices would benefit through receiving more funding from performing the health checks.
The initiative would also improve the PHO's performance in key health targets, measures on which it was compared with other PHOs throughout the country, practice support facilitator Kaylene Holland said.
Ms Holland, who has been working in the role about a year, was training two additional support workers appointed late last month.
Her 0.5 full-time-equivalent role had seen her stretched from "Kurow to Bluff", which was too much for one staff member, she said.
The three positions now equated to 1.5 full-time equivalent workers.
Ms Holland said the staff would work with the practices to improve their patient management systems, and would not directly contact patients.
