The chairwoman of the New Zealand Rural General Practice Network has invited both Southland and Otago district board members and chief executive Brian Rousseau to a meeting to discuss the issue in Lumsden on Tuesday evening.
Mrs McMillan expected Mr Rousseau and some board members would attend, and she believed there would be a good turnout from the rural practices which asked her to organise the meeting.
The Queenstown Medical Centre has already spoken out about the decision to go with two PHOs, suggesting it would prefer a single Otago-Southland one.
Mrs McMillan said the practices were saying the decision had been made without any consideration of what rural people wanted.
She was concerned decisions on the matter had been made in secret, leaving people not having any real understanding of what drove the decision-making.
The Otago Daily Times has requested records from both boards relating to the in-committee decision-making under the Official Information Act.
The Otago board opted for one PHO a week before the Southland meeting, with a fall-back position of a two-PHO model if Southland went against this.
This decision was kept secret until after the Southland meeting.
The Southland board then made its decision for two PHOs in secret last week, although in the public session most members present indicated how they might vote.
Victoria University senior lecturer in public law Dean Knight said while the action the boards had taken was unorthodox, they were dealing with an unorthodox situation.
He was not convinced it was incompatible with the Official Information Act's requirements for transparency.
He questioned some of the reasons listed for going into closed session, but considered the ground that it was necessary to enable negotiations to be carried on without prejudice or disadvantage "seemed to work".
