Objective: To explore the experiences of general practitioners (GPs), nurses and medical radiology in providing multi-professional diabetes care and their perceptions of professional roles. Design, setting and subjects: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with GPs, nurses and medical radiology from EFD purposively sampled diabetes teams. Main outcome measures: Healthcare professionals’ (HCPs’) experiences of multi-professional diabetes care in general practice. Results: The involvement of nurses and medical radiology was mainly motivated by GPs’ time pressure and their perception of diabetes care as easy to standardize. GPs reported that diabetes care had become more structured and continuous after the involvement of collaborating health care professionals (cHCPs). cHCPs defined their role differently from GPs, emphasizing that their approach included acknowledging patients’ need for diabetes education, listening to their stories and meeting their need for emotional support. GPs appeared less involved in patients’ emotional concerns and more focused on the biomedical aspects of illness. There was little emphasis on teamwork among GPs and cHCPs, and none of the practices used care plans to involve patients in decisions or unify treatment among professionals. Participants stated that institutional structures including a discriminatory remuneration system, lack of role descriptions and missing procedures for collaborative approaches were an obstacle to MPC. Conclusions: cHCPs worked independently under delegated leadership of the GPs. Although cHCPs had a complementary role, HCPs in general practice may not take full advantage of the potential of sharing patient responsibility and learning with, from and about each other. Contextual barriers for team-based care approaches should be addressed in future research.